


With My Body, I Thee Worship

by ShutYourPieHole (KnittingElf)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Regency, Angry Dean Winchester, Castiel is Bad at Feelings (Supernatural), Happy Ending, Illegitimacy, Injury Recovery, Justice, M/M, Mutual Pining, Oblivious Castiel (Supernatural), Oblivious Dean Winchester, Revenge, Sam Winchester is Lucifer, Slow Burn, Vicar & a Scoundrel, really just the slowest of burns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-09
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:00:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 29
Words: 37,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26376928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KnittingElf/pseuds/ShutYourPieHole
Summary: Dean Winchester, the illegitimate son of the Viscount of Gresham, has returned to Lawrence-in-the-Vale to get revenge on his half-brother, who has earned the nickname "Lord Lucifer" for his cruel treatment of tenants and household staff. While skulking in his half-brother's woods, Dean is caught in a trap set by Lord Lucifer. Luckily, Castiel Novak, the local vicar, arrives to save him. Cas has plans to use Dean to bring Lord Lucifer to justice, but Dean has different ideas. Their growing attraction complicates everything, but love can’t be denied.Basically a slow-burn, mutual pining sandwich. Minimal (OK, moderate) angst and a hopefully reasonable amount of Regency-era weirdness.
Relationships: Castiel & Dean Winchester, Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 5
Kudos: 32





	1. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean's in trouble. Good thing the village vicar is there to save him.

Dean was in hell.

Not that he believed in hell, but if hell existed, he was in it. He hadn’t seen the trap until it was too late, the strong metal jaws closing around his calf. _Fucking Lord Lucifer_ , he thought as he tried to stifle a groan of pain. How long before his half-brother’s dogs were loosed to hunt him down? That question got Dean moving.

He pried at the jaws of the trap, grimacing when the spikes moved in his leg. His devil of a brother had sharpened them. A curtain of blackness and stars threatened to swamp his vision. Dean heard the sound of someone panting, wheezing really, and then realized it was him. He sounded like the creatures he trapped and shot: panicked, feral. He gasped, trying to get more air into his lungs. The stars swept across his vision and he slumped to the ground.

***

A hard grip on Dean’s shoulder brought him to, and he found himself being hauled upright. The hand gripped him so tightly that it almost hurt worse than his leg. Almost.

“Mr. Winchester!” The voice was commanding. Dean looked up, wondering who would use such formal address with a bastard like him. Most folk didn’t call him anything, eyes sliding past him as if he did not exist. He knew they ignored him for fear of Lord Gresham, daring to call him Lord Lucifer in whispers behind village doors, but sometimes he felt like a ghost.

“Mr. Winchester!” The voice, deep and a little rough, broke through his hazy thoughts. Dean flung an arm out wildly, trying to defend himself against an attack. Instead, a hand caught him arm gently, a contrast to the hard grip on his shoulder. Dean looked up, head lolling back on his neck.

“…Vicar?” His voice came out as a whisper, but shock still threaded through it. What was the vicar doing in Lucifer’s woods? Nothing made sense. _I’m seeing things_ , Dean thought. _I’m dying and my last fucking thought is about the stuffy vicar_. Then Dean shook his head, clearing his vision. No, his last thoughts on earth would be about something more exciting than the vicar. He was alive.

“Yes. Good, you recognize me. Now we need to get you out of this trap.” Now that Dean was more alert, the vicar’s voice grew quieter. “I’m going to lower you back to the ground so that I can open it.”

“It’s deep,” Dean gasped, “Spikes…sharpened.”

“Good God,” the vicar looked aghast for a moment, but then his features smoothed over. “I think it would be wise for you to bite down on my cravat. We don’t want Lord Gresham to interrupt.” The vicar gently lowered Dean to the ground and then, with efficient, precise movements, unknotted his cravat and unwound it from his neck. Through the fog of pain, Dean saw that the vicar’s neck was quite a nice neck, a strong column leading down to a dip where his collarbones flared out like wings. _Maybe I_ am _dying_ , Dean thought. _Thinking about a vicar’s neck is the sort of odd thing a dying man might do_. 

The vicar folded the cravat into a thick pad and knelt down beside Dean, helping him place it between his teeth when Dean’s hands refused to maneuver the cloth. Then the vicar stood, moved to the trap, and swiftly pressed down on the springs on either side of the jaws. Dean felt the spikes pulling out from his leg, screamed into the cravat, and saw only black once again.


	2. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Castiel rationalizes his concern for Dean as not wanting his plans to go awry (spoiler alert: that's not the *only* reason why he's worried). He goes for help.

Castiel pressed his lips into a thin line as he looked at the sweaty, restless man who was dirtying his bedclothes. He had plans, and freeing Dean Winchester from a bear trap, carrying him back to the small vicarage, and nursing him through a fever were not part of those plans.

Dean had briefly regained consciousness as Castiel rolled him into the narrow bed. Cas had poured some tea down Dean’s throat and Dean had been lucid long enough to tell him the outline of what had happened, but when Cas started to clean the wounds on Dean’s leg, the man had lost consciousness. By that evening, Dean was burning with fever, delirious and thrashing. Cas spent most of the night by the bedside, dripping water into Dean’s mouth from a wet rag and laying cool cloths on his forehead.

Cas felt awkward in his role as a nurse. _I care for people from a distance_. _From the pulpit, from delivering charity to the needy_. Up close, people were chaotic. They didn’t follow rules or behave how they should. The fact that Dean Winchester was the best person to carry out his plans spoke to his desperation. Dean Winchester, the by-blow of the old Lord Gresham, was perhaps the most tangled person he had ever met. Well, not met. Dean never attended services, but Castiel had seen him, seen the rage and hurt and loneliness in every line of Dean’s body as he stalked through the village and pretended that the villagers’ ignoring him did not matter. Despite his separation from those around him, Cas had always felt like he could see people's souls even if he had trouble understanding their behavior.

Cas sighed. Dean was only getting worse, and he could not let his best hope for justice die. He washed his face in a basin, changed into fresh clothes, and headed for the tavern.

The tavern in Lawrence-in-the-Vale sat on the main road that cut through the village, although Castiel sometimes thought “road” was too generous a name. The tavern, though, was always clean and warm, and had two rooms upstairs for the occasional travelers who came through on business or had gotten lost. Ellen Harvelle, a widow, ran the tavern and served as village midwife and healer. Lord Gresham called for a doctor when he or someone in his household was ill, but Mrs. Harvelle took care of the rest.

“Good morning, Vicar,” she said, opening the door. “It is not yet nine o’clock in the morning, so I suppose you’ll be needing my help and not a pint.” She chuckled briefly but did not seem to expect him to laugh as well. Mrs. Harvelle had never tried to force Cas to mimic the mannerisms of other people, and he appreciated her for it.

“I do, Mrs. Harvelle. Mr. Winchester is ill, and I had to bring him to the vicarage.” The moment he had said the words, Cas thought, _But I didn’t have to bring him there_. _I could have taken him here to Mrs. Harvelle, or to his own house_. Cas frowned. “His leg was caught in a trap and I fear the wound is festering.”

Ellen nodded once and invited him to come inside while she gathered her herbs and tools. He declined. Cas always felt uneasy in other people’s homes, which made the vicarly duty of visiting his parishioners a torment. The October sun felt pleasant on his face, but a thread of cold fear pulled through him. “Please do not let him die,” he prayed. “He is an instrument of justice. Let him live.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is chapter 2! I'm going to do alternating POV because I really love how Castiel does not think like other people, and I wanted to really revel in his obliviousness.


	3. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean wakes up at the vicarage. He has Big Feelings but doesn't really know what to do about that.

Dean woke up alone. He looked around, not recognizing the room or the bed he was in. Panic shot through him. Was he at Pecklow Manor? Dean struggled to sit up, but fell back onto the bed, too weak. Broken images came back to him: the vicar gripping his shoulder like a vise, the vicar asking him what happened. Surely the vicar would not take Dean to his brother’s house. Dean tried to slow his breathing, turning his head on the pillow to look at the room again. No, it was too simple to be a room at Pecklow. Also, his God-bedamned brother would have tied him to the bed to prevent escape. _Or I would be dead and buried already_. His heartbeat slowed some, though it still beat too fast.

Dean could feel the fever making him shake, his leg a continuous twist of pain. Beside the bed he saw a small table with a glass of water, a pitcher, and a rag. He gripped the glass in a shaking hand and tried to bring it to his lips, but his fingers slipped and the water spilled over him, the glass rolling off the bed and onto the floor.

Feeling the water soaking into his shirt and the bedclothes beneath him, Dean let out a frustrated groan. _Helpless_. The thought burned through him worse than the fever. He had sworn to never be helpless again after what had happened to his mother, after what had happened to him. Today, he had been at the mercy of someone else twice, and he supposed he should be grateful that it was the vicar. He wasn't. The feeling settled in his throat, behind his eyes. _Do not cry_. Dean gritted his teeth. _Do not give Lucifer that satisfaction_. Dean had not cried since the day his mother died and he had been exiled. He would not cry now.

Tears tracked down his cheeks.

A sound from another room had Dean swiping weakly at his face. He heard the vicar’s low voice and a woman’s voice as well. Ellen. The one person in the village who met his eyes despite the threat of Gresham. He suspected that Ellen was the reason that his mother’s house was still his and not burned to the ground. Even Gresham would think twice before crossing swords with her.

When the vicar and Ellen came into the room, Dean panicked for a moment. Should he pretend to be asleep? He closed his eyes.

“Now there, Dean Winchester, open up your eyes. Being awake is a reason for hope, you know.” Ellen sat in the chair by the bed. Had the vicar sat with him? Dean looked beyond Ellen to see the vicar hovering in the doorway, as if he were unsure of whether to come in or leave Ellen to her work. Ellen turned and looked at the vicar, “And don’t you run away, Vicar. I will need your assistance.” The vicar’s shoulders slumped as he walked toward the bed. _A not-so-good Samaritan then_ , Dean thought with interest, and then choked back a wild laugh. The fever was clearly affecting his brain.

Ellen uncovered his leg and unwrapped the bandage that had been awkwardly tied around the wounds. After examining it, she said, “This is a dangerous wound, but not the worst I have seen. You did well to bring him here,” she said to the vicar as he stood beside her, completely still. “He will need nursing day and night. I can be here some of the time, but you might want to hire a woman to come and help. Sadie Thomas is about to give birth, and John Wright is nearing his end, so I might be called away.”

“I will care for him,” the vicar said, and Dean saw his eyes widen as he spoke the words, almost as if he were surprised to hear them. The vicar swallowed and then continued, “If you teach me what to do, I will do it.”

“Very well. Do not bleed him. He’s lost enough blood as it is. I’ll send Joanna by with broth later to build up the blood.” Ellen took from her bag a blunt-nosed syringe and several packets. “Now, you must boil these herbs in water for a quarter of an hour and then strain the mixture through a cheesecloth. Bring me the water when you are finished.” The vicar nodded and left the bedroom.

Ellen took a clean rag out of her bag and wet it in the water from the pitcher. “We’ll clean your wound last, young Winchester, but you’re all over dirt. We’ll need to change the bedding too.” She wrung out the rag and began to clean his face. When that was done, she raised him up with one arm and began to take off his shirt, which he was too tired and ill to resist. 

Ellen sucked in a small breath when she saw the scars on his chest, but she did not mention them. She did trace her hand over his shoulder. “Who gave you that bruise?” She asked. “Was it Gresham?”

Dean tipped his head down and saw the purpling handprint. “No,” he said, slurring a little, “It was. It was the vicar, I suppose. Keeping me from Lucifer.” Those short sentences exhausted him. Why would they not leave him to sleep? He wanted dark oblivion, not Ellen seeing his scars and the vicar hovering stiffly at the edges of the room.

Ellen humphed. “That’s not how to handle an injured man.”

Dean’s head lolled on the pillow. His thoughts were growing more confused. _He dragged me out of hell with one hand_. He didn’t know if he said it aloud or just thought it, but at last his eyes drifted closed and he knew nothing more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like things are going a bit slow right now...I promise I'll get things moving in the next few chapters!


	4. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Content note**: Descriptions of wound cleaning. I tried to make it not too graphic, but if descriptions of wounds/blood aren't your jam, take note and take care of yourself!
> 
> Ellen and Cas clean Dean's wounds. There is pus. Cas is surprisingly shaky throughout the whole procedure, but it surely could not be because he has feelings for Dean!

Cleaning the wound was a brutal exercise. Cas had known it would be bad, had seen the pus welling from the bite marks the trap had left in Dean’s leg, but he had not known that animal sounds would tear from Dean’s throat even though he remained unconscious. Cas had discovered that the pus and blood Mrs. Harvelle was flushing out of the wounds did not distress him. But Dean’s pained groans and whimpers cut through his brain—no, not his brain—through his chest. That was, well, odd. He cocked his head to the side, storing that discovery away to think over later.

Mrs. Harvelle had mixed the herb water with spirits and was now using the syringe to flush out each place where the sharpened teeth of the trap had pierced Dean’s leg. Cas held a bowl beneath Dean’s leg to catch the outflow. She flushed each wound again and again until all that drained out was blood.

“We’ll turn him over to do the other side,” Mrs. Harvelle said. “And this time you’ll do the main work.”

Cas swallowed against the tension in his throat as they turned Dean over as gently as they could, taking care not to jostle his leg. Dean still moaned and tried to pull away from their hands. Cas noted—dispassionately, of course—that while Dean was taller than him, Dean had a more solid frame. When Cas had been half-carrying, half-dragging Dean to the vicarage, he'd only felt determination to save the man who could bring Gresham to justice. Now he felt...curiosity? How did a man who seemed to spend most of his time skulking through the woods of Pecklow Manor and the rest drinking ale at the tavern have that many muscles? Another question to ponder.

Mrs. Harvelle briefly laid a hand on his shoulder. “Are you sure you can do this? Attending a sickbed isn't something everyone can manage.” Cas nodded, one short movement down and up.

“I can.” She looked at him like she was trying to see his thoughts, then shrugged.

“Very well. Take it slowly.”

Cas took the syringe. His hand shook as he positioned the syringe, which was strange. His hands were almost preternaturally steady. When he was a child, his sister Anna had often teased that he would be better at painting screens than she; he would never let a line go astray or accidentally load the brush with too much paint, leaving splotches as she did.

“Brace your wrist on your other hand,” Mrs. Harvelle said. “You’ll get steadier with practice.”

Cas furrowed his brow and did as she told. His hand steadied and he pressed the plunger, sending the mixture streaming into a wound.

“Good,” she said, “That’s the right amount of pressure. Keep it steady.”

When the syringe was empty, Cas sat back, regaining awareness of the room around him. While he had worked he had seen only the wound thought only about how he could not let Dean die. Cas looked into the bowl Mrs. Harvelle was holding. The mixture of red blood and white-green pus should have nauseated him, but instead he felt something like pride. He had done it. He wiped a sleeve across his brow, surprised to find he was sweating.

“Now, do it again,” Mrs. Harvelle said, her voice calm and slow, “Do it just the same way.”

In the end, it took Cas three quarters of an hour to flush out the rest of Dean’s wounds, and by the end he had soaked his shirt through with sweat. Mrs. Harvelle showed him how to apply salve and bandage the wound. They also changed the bedclothes and managed to get one of Cas’ nightshirts over Dean’s broad shoulders. Cas had looked away from Dean’s naked body. He knew there was nothing shameful in nudity, but it felt impolite to look at the man while he was so helpless.

“You will need to clean the wounds every three hours until the fever breaks,” Mrs. Harvelle informed him at the door to his room. “I’ll leave you enough herbs and spirits to last until tomorrow. If you need to sleep, have a way to wake up so that you don’t miss a cleaning.”

Cas nodded, went into his study and came back with two candles and a number of nails. “I use these to mark time,” he said as he began embedding nails at regular intervals down a candlestick.

“That will do,” Mrs. Harvelle said. “I will try to visit again before dusk, but if you need me, come by the tavern and my Joanna will know where I am. You can make some willow bark tea, but don’t give him too much. The fever might help burn out the infection.”

With that last bit of advice she left the house. Cas lit the candle and placed it on the chest that sat opposite the bed. He didn’t want Dean to topple the candle and set the bedclothes alight if he became delirious again.

By the end of the day, Cas had taken to fitfully dozing in the chair by Dean, only waking when a nail fell out of the candle and struck the metal tray below it. Mrs. Harvelle had been right—by the fourth cleaning Cas could finish his task in half an hour and his hands no longer shook. He felt hope—there was less pus each time.

But as night fell, Dean’s fever rose and he once again started to thrash. Mrs. Harvelle had not come. Joanna had stopped by to leave a piece of pork pie for Cas and the promised broth for Dean. Cas had slowly spooned the broth into Dean’s mouth. At first he had tried holding Dean up with one arm and feeding him from his other hand, but Dean was so heavy in his half-conscious state that eventually Cas sat against the headboard with Dean leaning against his chest so that he could get the broth down. The heat of his feverish body seemed to burn Cas's skin.

As Dean’s fever rose, Cas felt panic rising in his chest. Mrs. Harvelle had said not to give Dean too much willow bark tea, but how much was too much? He had already poured two cups down Dean’s throat, but it seemed to have very little effect. Cas rushed to the front door. He could go to the tavern; Joanna would tell him where her mother was, and then he could find Mrs. Harvelle and get the answers he needed. But as his foot crossed the threshold to the path outside the vicarage, he stopped, something holding him back.

“What should I do?” Cas turned his face to the sky. “Whatever I do, I fear I will kill him.” He did not get an answer, but then, he never had. He tried once more to cross the threshold, but again he felt something, something that did not just stop him, but that pulled him back to the room where Dean lay.

Cas did not sleep until false dawn turned the horizon gray. It was a mostly silent vigil, punctuated only by the occasional groans or restless movements of the sick man. In the stillest part of the night, Dean had struggled to rise from the pillow, shouting about hell and burning, and Cas had pressed him back down. Dean had flinched, and Cas remembered the bruise he had inflicted and immediately gentled his hand, but Dean had made a sound of protest, reaching up a hand to grip Cas's own as if it were a lifeline. Cas spent the rest of the night that way, finally moving off of the chair to sit on the floor when his arm muscles started to cramp. He leaned his head against the bed and dozed.

The next nail falling from the candle did not wake Cas, but instead the feeling of his hand sliding out of Dean’s grip. He jolted upright, a stab of fear going through his belly at the wild thought that he had just felt Dean’s soul leave his body. Cas forced himself to look at the man in his bed and then almost collapsed with relief when he saw Dean’s chest rise and fall under the sheet. Sweat sheened Dean’s face, and when Cas put his hand against Dean’s forehead, he could feel that the fever had broken. Cas did collapse then, his bones going liquid with relief and exhaustion as he sank onto the floor and slept.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some real old-timey nerdery in these notes:
> 
> 1\. Regency medicine was a trip. The humoral system (believing that the body was governed by a balance of the four humors: blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile) still influenced medical practice, and the germ theory of disease and sterilization of medical tools weren't around yet. Doctors were starting to take over the roles midwives and wise women had played in caring for the ill in communities and were touting themselves as the true experts, but they didn't know much themselves. Syringes (without a needle at the end) were a popular medical tool and would be used to flush out wounds or administer enemas. Syringes might also be used to flush out the bladder if a person had a bladder infection (thanks, antibiotics, for making that a thing of the past!). Most households would have a kit of herbs and other "medicines" like mercury (mercury is NOT medicine, thus the air quotes) that could help, hurt, or have no effect.
> 
> 2\. Putting nails or metal balls into candles to mark time was a real thing before reliable alarm clocks were invented near the end of the 1800s! (Here's a quick explanation, along with other alarm clocks, like...drinking a whole lot of water. I considered having Cas do this, but I thought it wouldn't be precise enough for him: https://www.thewellmadeclock.com/before-alarm-clocks/)


	5. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean wakes up. Much contemplation of the sleeping vicar ensues.

Dean felt like his eyes had been stuck shut with tree sap. He laid still and breathed slowly as he took stock of his body. His leg: it pained him. His shoulder: a duller, softer ache. His throat: dry and screaming for water. He forced his eyes open and let his head flop to the side so that he could see the room. Was he alone again? No, he heard the soft, regular breathing of someone sleeping. He tried to sit up but fell back to the bed when his muscles refused to do his bidding. With a grunt, Dean managed a half-turn, half-flop so that he could look over the side. The vicar lay on the floor, still in the clothes Dean had seen him in before losing consciousness yet again. Yes, it was losing consciousness, not fainting. Brave men like him lost consciousness, misplaced it briefly. They did not faint.

The water glass on the table was empty. He longed for water in that moment more than he had ever longed for ale, but something held him back from waking the vicar. The man, and Ellen, had saved his damned life, although he had vague memories of excruciating fire burning through his leg at intervals and thinking that Lucifer had come to finish him. He at least owed the vicar a few minutes of rest. Dean rested on his side, too exhausted to turn back over. His mind felt clear, but unfocused; if he tried to hold onto a thought, it slipped away. So he contemplated the simple room and the man on the floor.

The room was sparse and plain, just the bed he was in, the table, a chair, and a chest opposite the bed. If he looked beyond the foot of the bed, Dean could see a small clothespress, which must hold the vicar’s formal clothing, or did he keep it at the church? A small table with an even smaller mirror sat in front of the window. That must be where the vicar shaved. Dean had never seen the vicar with even a shadow of stubble when he was about in the village, and Dean had even pondered if vicars could grow beards in his drunker moments, but when he looked down beside the bed he saw that the vicar’s face was indeed darkened with the start of a beard.

The man sleeping on the floor looked quite different from the one Dean had seen in public. Instead of a pair of sober breeches, plain waistcoat and cravat, and somehow even plainer coat, the vicar was in his shirtsleeves, the neck gaping open. The braces holding up his trousers were crooked. His dark hair, not hidden beneath a hat for once, stuck up on one side and was matted on the other. Dean had no trouble concluding, despite his wandering mind, that the vicar looked a mess. And yet his eyes still rested on the vicar, the way his chest expanded with each deep breath and how his lips parted softly with each exhalation. The whole scene felt peaceful.

A noise at the door had Dean turning onto his back and his eyes closing. Brisk footsteps on the floor heralded Ellen, who walked into the bedroom saying, “I apologize, Vicar…oh!” Her footsteps stilled and her voice trailed off. Dean heard her feet approaching the bed, much more softly this time, and he felt her hand on his forehead. He tensed at the touch, giving himself away.

“Dean Winchester,” Ellen whispered, “I do not know why you keep pretending to sleep whenever I enter the room.”

He opened his eyes and saw that Ellen looked tired but satisfied. “Water?” he rasped out. Ellen filled the glass and helped him lift up his head so that he could drink. When he had swallowed every last drop, she lowered him back down. “Thank you,” he said, his voice smoother.

“I’ll go see if I can make up a bed for the vicar in another room, and then I will change your bedclothes. You shouldn’t lie in your own sweat. It’s not healthy for a body.”

Dean nodded and let his eyes close. Now that the worst of his thirst was quenched, he felt as if he could sleep for a day and a night. Ellen crept out of the room, barely making a sound, but Dean heard the vicar’s breathing change and then felt the vicar pulling himself up using the side of the bed. Dean sighed and opened his eyes. It would be best to get the thanks out of the way so that he could then interrogate the vicar and discover what in the God-damned world he had been doing in Pecklow Manor’s wood.

“Mr. Winchester, you’re awake,” the vicar said in the same tone of voice he would announce, “I expect it might rain today.” It rankled, though Dean could not imagine why. Fevers could leave a person with a weakened sensibility, perhaps?

Dean opened his mouth, intending to say something like, “Thank you for saving me from a bear trap set by my evil half-brother. Now, why in the hell did you do it?”

Instead, to his shock, he said, “My name is Dean, damn it!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like I'm figuring out how to get the story moving now...I got a little too into gruesome wound cleanings for a bit there.


	6. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Castiel doesn't know what do when Dean yells at him. He decides to reveal his plans to Dean. It does not go well.

Cas blinked once.

“And my name is Castiel.” Cas did not know why Dean was introducing himself, but he might as well follow the thread of the conversation. He stood up slowly, his joints stiff after his nighttime vigil.

“What kind of name is that?”

“It’s the name of an angel. My father was a minor noble in Poland and a Catholic. He left when Russia began interfering with his homeland.”

“But you’re a vicar.”

Cas examined Dean’s face. Dean did not look delirious or like the fever had stolen his wits. He looked, well, _curious_ was the only word that Cas could apply to that expression.

“Yes. My mother is Anglican and so are my sister and I. My father died before I began my studies, but he would not have opposed my choice.” Cas went silent, waiting for a response, but Dean just looked at him. Cas made his expression blank. Dean’s green eyes narrowed.

“No, no, don’t pull that trick again.” Dean pointed a finger at him. “You brought me here for a reason. And it’s not because you were doing me a kindness. You were following me that day, weren’t you?”

Cas nodded, a brief jerk of his head.

“Well, what is it? You have some dirty work you can’t sully your pure and angelic hands with that you need the village bastard to do?” Dean’s voice rose, and he nearly snarled the word “bastard.”

“I do have a job for you, but it’s not what you think. I need you to claim your birthright.”

Dean choked out a mirthless laugh.

“My birthright? Oh, I’ve claimed it. I’m the nobody, the by-blow, the thorn in Lord Lucifer’s side. That’s my birthright.”

“No…Dean,” Cas forced himself to use the name. “No. _You_ are Lord Gresham.”

Dean's mouth gaped open. “You’re mad. I thought you were just too good for common folk like us, but no. You’re just mad.”

“I assure you I am not mad,” Cas replied. “I found a parish register hidden away in the church. It records the marriage between the old Lord Gresham and your mother, Mary Winchester, before your birth. You are the legitimate heir.”

Dean’s face flushed. “I will never be Gresham, Vicar.” He was almost shouting now. “I don’t believe you.”

“If you’re going to shout at me, you might as well call me Cas.” Cas cocked his head to the side. He hadn’t meant to say that.

Dean fell back onto the pillow. “Talking with you is like talking to a sphinx.” He opened his mouth to say more, but Mrs. Harvelle bustled in.

“Now, gentlemen, what is this noise? Vicar, you had best not be upsetting the patient. He needs rest and quiet or the fever could return.” She grabbed Cas’ elbow and started to pull him out of the room. “I made up the guest room you keep for your sister, and you are going to go to sleep. I will stay here to watch after Dean.”

Cas let her lead him to the room, his mind spinning with exhaustion and confusion. Dean should be glad to have a position to claim. Cas had felt adrift until he found his role in the world, so why didn’t Dean feel the same? He saw that Mrs. Harvelle had laid out a nightshirt for him and turned to thank her, but she was already gone, the door closed. He thought briefly about changing, but simply tipped himself into the bed, over the covers, and slept.

When Cas opened his eyes again, light was coming in through the window. Was it the same day or the next? He stumbled up from the bed and saw a fresh change of clothing laid out for him on a chair by the washbasin, which had his comb and shaving tools beside it. Mrs. Harvelle must have come in while he slept. He washed, shaved, dressed, and tried to comb his hair into some semblance of order.

Despite how poorly yesterday’s conversation with Dean had gone, Cas felt cheerful as he went to check on him. He found Joanna sitting in the chair beside Dean’s bed, reading a book while Dean slept. She smiled at Cas, placing her finger in the book to mark her place.

“Good morning, Vicar. I trust you slept well?”

“I did, but for too long.”

“Mother said not to disturb you. Said you had done an admirable job of nursing Dean and would need your rest.”

“How is he?” Cas blinked at Joanna when her lips twitched. Had his voice broken as he asked?

“He is well. No more fever. Mother brought more broth. He won’t need constant attendance anymore. Just twice-daily changes of the dressing until the wounds close fully.”

Cas passed a hand over his eyes, feeling, what exactly? He felt his eyes prickle. Cas liked to keep his sensibilities well under control, but he had been feeling a surprising number of…feelings the past few days. Hopefully now that Dean was improving he would be able to sleep more and return to his usual state.

Joanna smiled at him again.

“Why are you smiling?”

“Oh,” Joanna looked to the side. “It’s just a lovely day.” She looked back at Cas and rushed on, “Mother asked me to stay here until you had eaten something and taken care of any parish business. No deaths, but Sadie Thomas had her baby and the family will want him baptized this Sunday.”

Cas shook his head, still confused, but thanked her. He found food in the kitchen left by the woman who usually cooked for him, and then headed to the village. He would stop to visit the Thomases. He also needed to collect that parish register. He needed to lay Dean's doubts to rest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Da da dum! I'll try not to get too wrapped up in Regency inheritance/legitimacy law in this next bit.


	7. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean discovers his mother's secret. Cas learns about privilege. Dean begins a catalog of Cas's facial expressions and wants to make Cas smile.

Dean stared at the register propped open on his legs. He rested against the headboard, still in one of the vicar’s…Cas’s nightshirts. His shoulders stretched the fabric tight, and he rolled them to try to settle the shirt more comfortably.

The faded ink, written in a shaky hand, read, “24 June. John, Viscount of Gresham of Pecklow Manor, bachelor (groom) and Mary Winchester of Lawrence-in-the-Vale (bride) by common license. Witness, Robert Singer (gamekeeper).” Below that there were four signatures, the first in the vicar’s shaky hand, then a bold slash that must be old Gresham’s, his mother’s delicate hand, and then the witness’. Dean traced his mother’s signature, fingertips skating over the page as light as a moth’s wings brushing against a leaf.

“He…Gresham _married_ her?” Dean looked up at Cas, who sat beside the bed, his face carefully neutral but his blue eyes searching Dean’s own.

“Yes,” Cas said. “Your parents were both of age, so the marriage stands. Your father was a bigamist, and you are Gresham.”

Dean let his head fall back to rest on the wall. Cas's calm recitation made this news even more confusing. “I don’t, I need, I’m…” He groaned, rubbing a hand over his eyes and down over his chin. “I don’t want to believe this. Why? Why marry my mother and then marry someone else?”

Cas shifted in his chair and looked away before replying, “Why do humans do anything? We are taught that we are rational creatures, but most people rarely act in accordance with what their reason would tell them to do.”

Dean looked more closely at the vicar. At Cas. Cas seemed genuinely puzzled. _Maybe he’s not aloof. Maybe he just doesn’t understand people that well_.

“I can imagine several rational reasons old Gresham would abandon my mother. A wealthy bride. The threat of disinheritance. Hell, even just growing bored of her and her rustic manners. It’s the marrying her that doesn’t make any sense to me.”

Cas frowned. Dean had quickly categorized Cas’s facial expressions since there was little else for him to do. There seemed to be only three: 1) blank, 2) puzzled frown, and 3) wildly desperate. The last one took up most of Dean’s thinking. What could push such a controlled man to look so passionate, for lack of a better word? It did not seem to be his grand plan to force Dean into being Gresham. He had looked that way when Dean was nearly gone with fever. Now that Dean was recovering, Cas’ face stayed almost entirely with expression number one, occasionally dipping briefly into expression number two.

“I will not hazard a guess as to his motives, but I understand the result. This marriage was never dissolved. It seems the old vicar died later that year, and when your baptism was recorded the following year there was no father listed. The conclusion is simple.”

“Oh, yes. My mother loved him even after he got married—remarried, or whatever you call bigamy. The only thing she was ever foolish about.” Dean sighed and closed his eyes. “Vic—Cas, I don’t care what the register says. I am not and I will not be Gresham.”

“Why not? You would have the position and power to right wrongs. You would be better than this Gresham. You could improve the village. You would know your place and have a clear purpose.”

Dean snorted and cracked open an eye. “You don’t know much about the world, do you?”

Puzzled frown. “I have studied, I have traveled, I would say that I know a great deal of the world.”

Dean had to stop himself from laughing. Cas was so ingenuous, so innocent, compared to the people he was used to; he might take Dean’s laughter as mocking when really the urge came from the first rush of pure, uncomplicated amusement Dean had felt in years.

“But have you struggled? Have you feared for your life? Have people with power wished to do you ill and succeeded? That’s what I mean when I say you don’t know much about the world. People who have seen the world as I have don't want power over others.”

Puzzled frown. “I suppose you are correct.” Then Cas’ blue eyes lit up and his mouth actually turned up a bit at the corners. “But my father told me of his struggles leaving Poland and starting anew in England.”

“But he was a noble. Did he bring money with him?” Cas’ face fell. Dean found himself reaching out to gently touch Cas’ hand. He’d meant to show Cas he was wrong, not make him unhappy. “I don’t mean this harshly. It’s good to not have experienced what I have. My soul is shriveled and cracked after taking one too many blows, and making decisions that affect a nation has no appeal. Your own happy childhood and life aren’t something to feel shame about. Just don’t make decisions about other people’s lives based on your own.” Dean tried to make his voice light, but it sounded weary to himself. 

Cas looked down at where their hands touched, puzzled frown firmly in place, and Dean withdrew. He was bollocksing this up horribly. First he’d insulted the man, and now he was making him uncomfortable.

Cas tilted his head to the side. “I wouldn’t call my childhood happy, I think. I was…content. But people, even my own family, never quite understood me. They always wanted me to be more like them, and I tried, but I couldn’t. It made me unhappy. It made them unhappy. I could see it in how they were always a little too careful around me. It’s why I went to university and took orders. I found a place, a position, where I could be myself and no one would bother me about it.”

Dean stared at Cas. He had never heard the vicar say that many words in a row outside of his duties. Cas caught Dean’s gaze, blushed a little, and looked down. “I know that is not like the trials you have experienced. You think me silly.”

“No,” Dean’s voice came out rough and deep, “No. I was born a bastard—or not, but everyone thought I was—but my mother loved me for who I was, even though I was only trouble. Christ, even Ellen likes me for who I am, and I’ve given her no reason to.”

Cas lifted his head and almost smiled. It flickered right at the corners of his lips. Dean had the sudden urge to coax that smile fully into being, to nurture it carefully, to keep away anything that could extinguish it.

“Yes. Mrs. Harvelle makes me happy because she does not try to change me. She is a good woman. And you are a good man.”

Now Dean did laugh. “That’s the first lie I think you've ever told. I am not a good person. Remember? My soul is shriveled and cracked.” Before Cas could reply, Dean pushed on. All of this talk of goodness and understanding was uncomfortable. Dean hadn’t talked like this since he was a child, safe in his mother’s arms. _Do I feel safe here?_ “But why do you address everyone so formally? We’re common folk here, not gentry who need constant reminding of our own consequence.”

“It’s proper. I treat everyone with the dignity they are due.”

Dean threw his head back and laughed, a deep, true laugh. “That you do. But you told me to call you Cas.”

Another puzzled frown. Dean should keep tally and inform Cas how often and in what circumstances he used his three expressions. “Well, you were shouting at me, and you never attend services, so it seemed silly to insist that you use my title.”

Dean nodded. “That makes sense. I will call you Cas, but only if you promise to call me Dean in return. No more Mr. Winchester. And certainly no Gresham.” He stretched out his hand. Cas regarded it for a second before clasping Dean’s hand firmly in a handshake.

“Very well. I will call you Dean.”

Dean smiled, and Cas gave the smallest smile in return. Dean’s heart thudded.

 _Oh bollocks_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew, I successfully avoided going down a rabbit hole of Regency-era legitimacy and inheritance law.


	8. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean wants answers. Cas obliges. Dean smolders at Cas and gets a chance to expand his Cas Expression Encyclopedia.

Cas sat at the table in his small kitchen with his head in his hands. He’d said, “I will call you Dean,” not “I have called you that in my thoughts since, well, since the second time I saw you and asked Mrs. Harvelle who you were. I don’t know why, but I saw you as someone familiar. Familiar comes from Latin _familiaris_ , meaning ‘household servants’ or ‘family,’ but I don’t mean it in quite that sense.” God, even in his head he was pedantic.

What was he doing? He had thought Dean would welcome his plan, but the man refused to even consider it. And rather than explaining why Dean should want to take on the mantle of a viscountcy, he had instead talked about his youth, exposing a vulnerable spot he guarded with carefully cultivated detachment. Dean had him at sixes and sevens.

“Cas!” Dean’s voice cut through his reverie, and he started. Shaking his head, Cas got up to see what Dean needed.

“I need more of an explanation.” Dean’s brows furrowed. “Where did you find this register? When did you find it? Why did you follow me to the wood that day?”

Cas opened his mouth, but no words came out. Dean’s lips quirked up at the corners.

“Let’s start with the first question, then. Where did you find the register? I can’t imagine it was lying out in the open where anyone could discover old Gresham’s secrets.”

Now Cas knew where to start. “It was under a floorboard in the sacristy.” At Dean’s blank look, he added, “It’s the room where I prepare for services and keep my vestments.”

Dean nodded, and motioned Cas to continue.

“I had noticed the floorboard creaked and seemed to be getting looser, so I pried it up to see if it had warped. But the register was underneath it, wrapped in oiled cloth.”

“And when did you find it?”

Cas paused. He suspected Dean would not like the answer. “About two months ago.”

Dean did not like that answer. “Two months?” he shouted. Thank God Mrs. Harvelle wasn’t in the house. Cas reached out to pat Dean on the shoulder, or to do something, but then thought better of it and sat heavily in the chair beside the bed.

“Yes. At first I didn't dare believe it, but then I looked through the later registers and saw your birth recorded. I wrote to a friend who checked the registers at the prior Lady Gresham’s home parish to see how her marriage to old Gresham was recorded. It seems no one besides your mother, the gamekeeper, Gresham, and the old vicar knew of the marriage.”

“That’s not enough of a reason to delay telling me.”

“I was going to tell you, but then I saw you going into the Pecklow Manor wood many days, and I suppose I was curious. I wanted to know what you were doing before I approached you.”

“You followed me for months?” Dean swung his legs over the edge of the bed and attempted to stand, his face flushed with anger, but the man had only been eating broth for days at this point, and he wavered before sitting down abruptly, half leaning on Cas.

“No, God no! I only followed you that one time, and I was going to find you to tell you,” Cas said as he helped Dean rearrange himself on the bed, trying to keep his touches as brief and impersonal as possible. “I didn’t want to call on you in the village—I feared the news would cause a reaction.”

Dean laughed through a cough, relaxing slightly, “You were right about that.” But then his eyes narrowed, “But I am still angry at you. I don’t appreciate being watched.”

 _But what if I can’t help watching you?_ The words burst into Cas’ mind, and he lost his train of thought. He took a deep breath to regroup.

“I am sorry for the delay, if only because I might have spared you from your brother’s trap. But I suppose I wanted to know more of who you are.”

“And you found out I’m a poacher.”

“No, I discovered a man who cares about justice and helping others.”

Dean rolled his eyes. “You’re imagining things, Cas. I’m a selfish bastard in the most literal sense. I live for the pleasures of the moment. I steal game from my brother’s land to spite him. I plot a larger revenge, but only to cause him pain, not to set anything right.”

Cas leaned forward, taking one of Dean’s hands in his grip before he realized he was doing it. “I see a man eaten up with anger at what was done to him and his mother. But when he trespasses on the land that is rightfully his, he takes the game and gives it to Mrs. Harvelle, who makes sure it ends up in the bellies of the sick and hungry. I see a man, ignored by most of the villagers, who still lends his hands when hard or dangerous tasks need doing. I see a good man.” Were Dean’s eyes brighter than usual?

Dean blinked rapidly, squeezed Cas’ hand, and laughed.

“That’s four, Cas.”

Cas frowned. “What?”

Dean pulled himself up and said in Cas’ ear, “Passionate certainty. Your fourth facial expression.” Dean pulled away, his green eyes sharp and intense. “You’re not the only one watching.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I'm constitutionally incapable of not writing a slow burn. My sister once called me a shiboopi (like in the Music Man song) because I am the slowest mover ever in relationships, so count yourselves warned.


	9. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean resolves to not debauch the vicar. There is some mad flirting going on. Cas's smiles have tremendous power.

Dean sighed as the warm autumn sun sank into his skin. Cas’s back garden faced south, and as Dean watched Cas pruning his shrub roses, Dean felt drowsiness stealing over him. Ellen had said he needed to spend time outdoors, and each day for the past week he had taken one or two turns about the garden before settling in a chair to watch Cas bring in the last of his autumn vegetables and prepare the place for winter. Cas had insisted that Dean lean on him as he took his daily walks until Dean’s legs were stronger, and was never far from Dean’s elbow even after he could manage the walks by himself. He was slower, his injured leg still paining him, but he was steady.

They hadn’t spoken of Dean’s near-flirtation.

Dean could scarcely believe he’d said those words into Cas’s ear. He tried not to think about how much he had enjoyed that brief moment when his lips had almost brushed the dark hair at Cas’s temple. Dean had enjoyed the company of men and women and felt no guilt, but he drew the line at debauching innocent, otherworldly vicars. Cas had seemed unperturbed by that conversation, his countenance as still and placid afterwards as before. True, Cas seemed to flush when Dean’s gaze rested on him as he worked in the garden, but that would be from the exertion of digging out plants for transplanting and turning over the soil in the vegetable beds.

They hadn’t talked about Cas’s plan again. But one afternoon, Cas had asked him about his own plans for revenge, and Dean finally admitted that he didn’t have much of one besides “annoy evil, younger half-brother by killing game on his land and giving it to the poor.” Dean had insisted, “Revenge is a process, Cas, not a single act. I’m in the process.” Cas had surprised him by laughing and then asking Dean about his Grand Revenge Process at least twice a day.

Damn it, Dean _liked_ Cas. He liked many people, but not many good people. Ellen, he supposed, was a good person, for all the world might see a widow running a tavern with her daughter as unusual, if not unsavory. No one in Lawrence-in-the-Vale would dare think it, but Dean had known enough prigs to see how unusual that lack of judgment was.

Cas was good without any qualifiers. He had a stone-faced countenance, but he was cheerful and curious, taking an evening to show Dean his collection of insects and the careful drawings he had done of them. "These are all from my early days of study," he had said, gesturing at the fragile specimens pinned to a board. "Now I draw them where they are. Killing them seemed too cruel." Whenever Dean had asked a question or added his own observations, Cas had nodded with enthusiasm, his eyes lighting up. _Expression number five._

Cas never seemed to find Dean a burden, even dragging a hip bath into the room and running back and forth with buckets of water he had pumped and heated over the kitchen fire, all so that Dean could soak his injured leg and have what Cas called “a proper wash.” For a brief moment, Dean had thought about doing something foolish, like splashing Cas with water or making a joke about a vicar having a naked man in his bedroom, but Cas had so politely turned his head away from Dean’s nakedness that he washed as quickly as possible, touched by Cas's thoughtfulness. He had contented himself with teasing after discovering that Cas thought his own fondness for warm baths a moral weakness. If nothing else, bringing up warm baths would stop Cas if he dared to bring up the Grand Revenge Process.

But he was returning home tomorrow. Ellen had declared him fit to look after himself, and Cas had said nothing to make him stay. As he sat there in the sun, Dean could not think why that stung. It felt good, he supposed, to have someone take care of him. He had taken care of himself since the age of thirteen, when his mother died and old Gresham had driven him out of the village. The hungry, desperate years that followed taught him to rely on no one but himself, but it was an exhausting way to live. Some folk had tried to care for him, but their care had always come with a cost— _join our congregation, live by our rules, swear off earthly pleasures, be someone else, someone we find…easier_ —and Dean would not pay the price they asked. It was an exhausting way to live.

One evening, as they sat at the solid, scarred kitchen table, Dean had let himself be drawn out about his past. He had left out the worst parts, glossing over the time between his exile and discovering his trade.

“A horse dealer?” Cas had asked, with the puzzled frown Dean had expected.

“Yes, a lowly trader of horseflesh from the English Channel to Aberdeen.” Dean felt uncomfortably certain that Cas had gleaned more about the hardships of his youth than he had intended, so he told the story of his horse dealing in the style of a comic adventure.

Cas’s eyes lit up and he even chuckled when Dean spoke of the first sale he had made, a swaybacked nag to a kindly, if eccentric, pair of women who named the beast Josephina-Maria the First on the spot and promised the confused creature a life of comfort. His brows furrowed when Dean explained the tricks other horse dealers would use to make a worn-out or diseased horse appear healthy and strong. Dean was glad he could report that he had never stooped to such stratagems. If Cas wanted to believe he was good, he would maintain the illusion as long as possible.

“It’s about matching the horse to the best person for it,” he finished, tea that Ellen had brought forgotten in front of him. “I’ve seen London swells who think they know the measure of a horse and want a matched pair for their curricle, but what they really need is a pair of patient, intelligent horses of no particular color who won’t mind too much that an idiot is driving them through city traffic.”

Cas had outright laughed at that, throwing his head back and exposing the column of his throat. “I now have the solution to one mystery about you,” Cas had said once he finished.

“What mystery is that?” Dean took a drink of his tea, grimacing when he discovered that Ellen’s herbal concoctions did not improve when cooled.

“Now I know why you have a horse.”

 _Ah, Baby_. Dean knew it was unusual for a man of his station to own a horse so fine. His mare wasn’t in the latest style for horses, too solid, perhaps, for those who preferred their mounts to have delicate legs, and a liver chestnut coat with one white sock on her right foreleg. But she could run like the wind if you let her, and he cared for her more carefully than for himself. Indeed, after shouting at Cas the morning his fever broke, he had begged Ellen to look after the mare. “Already done,” she replied. “Truly, Dean, did you think I wouldn’t make sure your dearest love was well-cared for?” Ellen had shaken her head and muttered something about untrusting scoundrels.

“Yes. A benefit of my line of work is seeing many horses.”

“But horses are expensive.” Dean had smiled at that.

“They are indeed. But village greens for grazing and a kindly tavern-owner who will let you stable your mount for a pittance make the cost easier to bear.” Dean paused, then added, “I also did well for myself. I have saved enough to live comfortably for years. I could keep a stable of horses if I chose to.” Dean had looked down at the table, his face flushing. Why did he want Cas to know he had money? Cas didn’t seem to care about worldly things—besides warm baths—and he might think less of Dean for being proud.

Cas had merely nodded, his expression neutral. “So then I have a new mystery.”

“Do I dare ask what?”

“If you were living a happy and successful life, why come back?”

Dean would have liked to know the answer to that question too.

He shook himself out of his half-doze. Cas had finished pruning and digging and was sitting on the ground beside Dean’s chair, his insect journal open. He sketched a ladybird making its way across a leaf. Dean shifted slightly to look over Cas’s shoulder at the drawing. Cas looked up and smiled, the first full smile Dean had seen, and Dean’s breath caught in his throat. No one should be allowed to be so close to Cas when he smiled. It was a danger to one’s health. He swallowed.

“It’s a ten-spot ladybird,” Cas said. “We won’t see them much longer. They are running out of food and will spend the winter sleeping.”

The only thing Dean could do was nod. He didn’t trust his voice. Cas closed his journal and stood, holding his hand out to help Dean up from the chair, and Dean held on a moment longer than he needed to, but then dropped Cas’s hand to follow him indoors.

“Mrs. Harvelle said she would bring by something special to celebrate your recovery for our supper tonight. I hope you're hungry.” Cas looked back over his shoulder.

Dean’s stomach rumbled as if on cue. He laughed. Cas smiled again. _Do not debauch the vicar_ , Dean reminded himself as he went inside for his last supper at the vicarage.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All my knowledge of horse trading comes from reading 19th-century British novels, the foremost of which is Middlemarch, by George Eliot. She is a queen.
> 
> My inspiration for Cas's insect enthusiasm comes from Wives and Daughters, a novel by Elizabeth Gaskell. The heroine of the book learns about science and nature from her love interest, who brings her a wasps' nest as a gift at one point. The book is good and the BBC adaptation is truly delicious.


	10. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean takes Cas on a picnic. Cas takes off his cravat. Finally there is smooching.

Cas sighed as he closed the door to the church behind him. His throat felt raw after a morning of speaking loud enough for the congregation to hear and then conversing with the parishioners and giving counsel to those who asked for it. He felt raw inside as well, lonely after eight days empty of Dean. The day had turned unusually hot for October, and he tugged at his neckcloth. Shoulders slumped, he turned to make his way back to the vicarage and its cool silence.

“Cas.”

He turned to see Dean rounding the corner of the church, and his breath stopped. Dean looked well, his face no longer drawn and pale, his limp less noticeable. But more than that, he looked almost happy, his eyes bright, and even though he wasn’t smiling, there was something about the set of his mouth that made Cas think of summer sunshine in the garden. Cas realized he hadn’t spoken yet and that Dean’s steps were faltering.

“Dean,” he said, louder than he meant to. “It’s good to…you look well.” Dean smiled at that and closed the distance between them.

“Hello, Cas.” Dean rubbed the back of his neck with one hand and ducked his head down. “I, well, I wanted to thank you for saving my life, and I remembered you were tired that one Sunday after services, so I thought you might like some pie and quiet, or not quiet, or…” He trailed off.

“Is that Mrs. Harvelle’s pork pie I smell? Because I am hungry.”

Dean looked up and flashed a smile as he lifted a cloth bundle for Cas’s inspection. “It is. Ellen sends it with her compliments and said to tell you that if you accept this pie, you are promising not to needle her about missing services this morning.”

“I would promise just about anything for that pie right now, so consider it a deal.”

Dean raised one eyebrow. “Anything?”

“Well, within reason.” Cas turned to walk, and Dean fell into step beside him.

“Hm…I remember you saying that we humans aren’t very good at reason.”

“What would you have me promise?” Cas’s heart thudded in his chest.

“Oh, not much. For now, at least. Today, promise that you’ll follow me—I won’t take you far.”

Cas’s heart sped even more. “I promise.”

Dean’s stride relaxed and his shoulders dropped down as they entered the small woodland at the west end of the village. Cas glanced sideways at him from time to time, or more often than that, if he was being honest. Following people and acting without knowing the outcome always made him nervous, but Dean seemed so happy that Cas had trusted him in this one, small thing. They walked in companionable silence.

The wood opened up in front of them to reveal a small wildflower meadow, now gone to seed, surrounded by trees in different shades of reds, oranges, and yellows. The sun shone strong in the clearing, releasing the scents of warm earth and fading greenery. Cas tipped up his face to the light and smiled. “This is lovely. Thank you, Dean.”

Dean coughed. “Don’t thank me until I’ve fed you, at least. Here.” He untied the cloth, revealing a smaller bundle inside. He spread the cloth on the ground and opened up the packet. Cas looked at the food, and then at his formal jacket and waistcoat, pausing for a moment before taking them off along with his hat and laying them over a sturdy bush at the edge of the clearing. Dean positively grinned at Cas as he returned.

“You look well,” Cas said, sitting down and accepting a pie from Dean. The rich aroma of meat and spices made his mouth water.

“You already said that.”

“Oh. Well, it’s true.” Cas felt his face flush and didn’t know where to look, so he focused on the pie, taking bites from the thick crust and savoring the hearty filling. “Mrs. Harvelle may miss services as much as she wishes.”

Dean laughed. He had somehow eaten his entire pie in the space of just a few minutes. “I’ll tell her the good news.” They lapsed back into silence as Cas finished his meal.

Dean shifted and reached for his jacket, which had ended up by Cas. For a moment, Cas thought that maybe Dean was reaching towards him, and could not tell if he was relieved or disappointed when Dean instead pulled a small, rectangular package wrapped in thick, brown paper from a pocket.

“I—I noticed you were near the end of your journal, so I also wanted you to have this.”

Cas’s fingers shook slightly as he unwrapped the journal, a small notebook bound in soft leather, the pages already cut, the paper smooth. Beside it was a new cedar pencil. It was clearly expensive, and Cas wondered where Dean had traveled to buy something so fine.

“Why are you being so kind to me?” He asked, then flushed, mortified. “I mean, thank you. But why?”

Dean shrugged. “You saved my life. And drawing insects makes you happy.”

Something hummed in Cas’s chest, sending shivers down his nerves. His cravat felt too tight, like it would choke him if he didn’t get it off. He reached for the knot, and noticed Dean’s eyes fixed on his fingers undoing the cloth. Cas felt a rush of something, something he hadn’t felt before but knew from books. Boldness. Recklessness, even. He realized he was disappointed that Dean hadn’t reached for him. Cas wasn’t so bold as to close that gap, but he could try to keep that glazed look in Dean’s eyes, give him a gift in return. He slowed his movements.

“You realize,” Cas said, pulling one end free from the first part of the knot, “That feeding me after services and giving me a new insect journal only add to the evidence that you’re a good man.” Dean’s lips parted on a puff of breath as Cas unwound one wrap of the cravat.

Part of Cas’s mind remained separate from his actions, observing, but he felt gripped by that feeling in his chest, like it was telling his hands what to do next. The hum in his chest became an urgent buzz as he started to work on the next part of the knot. “You said you didn’t like being watched, and I’m sorry I spied on you, but I think it’s more than that. I think you don’t want people to notice that you…” He paused as he worked loose a fold of fabric to expose even more of his neck. “…are kind.”

Dean seemed caught in a spell, unblinking and still, as if Cas were a rare butterfly and Dean had come upon him unexpectedly before freezing in place, not wanting to disturb or frighten. “Indeed, I begin to suspect, after thinking over it this past week, that you returned home because you wanted to help.”Another knot loose.

“Because you.” Tug.

“Dean.” The final knot.

“Are good.” Cas slipped the cravat free from his neck, and Dean closed his eyes on an almost-silent groan.

Cas did not know what to do next. He tensed, preparing to run to the next county and never return. Humiliation coursed through him.

Dean opened his eyes. “I tried,” he said, and surged forward, bringing his mouth to Cas’s in a kiss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You don't want to know how much I read about pencils as I worked on this chapter. Trust me.


	11. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> SMOOCHING.

_I’m mad_. Cas had bared his neck, but Dean felt stripped, exposed. Cas’s words had torn through the armor around his heart until all he had left was _want_. He heard Cas gasp, and pulled back just enough to ask, “Is it..?”

“Yes.”

Dean pulled Cas back to him, hand cupping Cas’s jaw and the side of his neck. Cas gripped his shoulders, hands strong, anchoring Dean when he felt he might fly up into the air and burst in a shower of sparks. Cas’s lips were firm, the beginnings of stubble on his face scraping lightly over Dean’s chin. Dean moved his other hand to Cas’s back, pressing him closer. Cas slanted his head, teasing Dean’s lower lip with the tip of his tongue.

Dean tore his lips away for a moment, panting, “God, Cas…” and then dove back in, meeting Cas’s tongue with his own.

He slowed the kiss, exploring Cas’s mouth, nipping lightly at the other man’s lower lip, pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth. Cas sighed against his cheek, and Dean stroked the edge of Cas’s jaw. He felt electrified, like the time he had held a wire at a demonstration and invisible force had jolted through his body. He kissed his way over to Cas’s ear. “You’re so beautiful, Cas, so…” He grunted with surprise when Cas… _growled_ and tipped him back onto the ground, the kiss turning urgent. Cas speared a hand through Dean’s short hair and took over, claiming Dean’s mouth, but Dean felt Cas’s other hand gently stroking his arm. The contrast of fierceness and tenderness almost undid him. He moaned, clasping Cas tight.

They kissed for what felt like hours, days, but it still felt too soon when Cas shifted over to Dean’s side and rested his forehead on Dean’s shoulder, breathing fast and hard. Dean stared up at the sky, where small clouds dappled the expanse of blue. His mind was a blank, a contented hum resonated through his body. He had always liked kissing well enough, had practiced plenty, but this felt like a revelation, like the heavens had opened up and a light had shone upon him, revealing the mysteries of the world.

Cas propped his chin on Dean’s shoulder.

“What does ‘I tried mean’?”

Dean turned his head to look at Cas and smiled. “I made a solemn vow to myself not to debauch you.”

“Ah,” Cas frowned. “Why?”

Dean laughed. “Because you’re the village vicar?”

Cas frowned more and sat up. “What does that have to do with kissing?”

Dean felt a stab of panic below his sternum. “I—“ _Don’t fuck this up_. “You’re so good, pure—I don’t know what I’m saying. I didn’t want to ruin you?”

Cas threw his head back and laughed. Dean stared at him, confused.

“Ruination is for society misses, Dean,” Cas said, and then flushed. “Also, if by ‘pure’ you mean inexperienced, then you’re wrong.”

“You…?”

Cas sighed. “Yes, Dean.”

“I didn’t mean…” Dean covered his eyes with one hand and groaned. “I’m absolute shite at this.”

Cas tugged his hand down. “Explain, please.” Dean searched Cas’s face—puzzled frown. So maybe he wasn’t angry, just confused.

“I always thought of you as not quite of this world, which I don’t think makes sense now that I say it, but you were just…removed from the people around you. You watched us, but you didn’t exactly join us. I suppose I had trouble imagining you doing things like everyone else did.” He chuckled. “I even wondered if vicars were capable of growing beards if I had too much ale at Ellen’s tavern.”

“Of course I can grow a beard.” Still puzzled frown. Dean pushed on.

“I’m trying to say that I misjudged you, Cas, that I'm sorry, and I’m making a hash of it.”

Cas’s face cleared, and he nodded. “I accept your apology.”

Dean blinked. “If that was an apology, it was terrible.”

Cas laughed. “It was. But I still accept it.” He took Dean’s hand and squeezed. Dean felt that squeeze in his heart. He cleared his throat.

“So, any experiences you care to share?” He waggled his eyebrows.

Cas snorted. “I know what you’re doing. You’re changing the subject.”

“Is it working?”

“Yes,” Cas sighed. “It wasn’t a grand romance or anything scandalous, if that’s what you were hoping for. I had a friend at university. We shared a love men and a hatred of _Fordyce’s Sermons_. We parted as friends.”

Dean grinned at the dry recitation and pulled Cas into another kiss.

“What was that for?”

Dean paused to think. “Because I’m happy, I suppose. I like thinking that we share more than a dislike of a book of stuffy sermons.”

Cas gave him a small smile as he pulled Dean back down onto the ground. “I like that too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a lot of smooching.


	12. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Plot things happen. Cas has a horrible realization.

Cas smiled as he gazed out of the window in his study, watching the light change as the sun neared the horizon. They had lingered in the clearing, only leaving when the church bell rang five times. Cas hadn’t realized his cravat was missing until he had reached the vicarage, but it was too late now to go and look for it. He laughed at himself when he realized he wouldn’t have gone to look for it anyway—the content, heavy feeling in his bones erased the usual worry about appearing in his public uniform.

True, a small spark of panic burned in his gut. Cas frowned as he contemplated it. He had built up the barriers against his feelings over years, the disappointment of his family and their inability to understand him had hurt so deeply that he had retreated, spending time with books and philosophy. These could not wound him like people did. That Dean had broken through his defenses, torn through them like they were nothing more than a spiderweb spun across a path, was alarming. That happiness and contentment coursing through him could turn into unbearable pain, and he didn’t know if he had the strength to rebuild himself again.

The rattle of a carriage coming down the lane shook him out of the reverie. The vicarage sat on the edge of the village at the end of a small lane, so the carriage had to be for him. And only one person nearby owned a carriage. Cas leapt up from his chair and ran to his room to find a cravat. There was only time for a simple knot, but that would not—should not—be a concern.

He made his way to the front door just as his visitor rapped on the other side. Lord Gresham pushed his way in when Cas opened the door, great coat and hat making him seem even larger. His hair was longer than fashion dictated, but he wore it with a rakish grace. Gresham towered over Cas, face shadowed in the evening light.

“Good evening, Lord Gresham.” Cas bowed, and Gresham gave the briefest nod in return. “May I take your coat and hat?” Cas felt his muscles tense, readying to flee. Unfortunate that a vicar could not simply run away from a wicked lord and hide in the woods until he left.

“No need,” Gresham said, his voice too loud in the small entry. “I’m only here for a moment to tell you the good news: I have found a wife.”

Cas started, eyes meeting Gresham’s. The man was smiling, but not a happy smile. The set of his mouth seemed to insinuate that he knew all about Cas’s plans and was one move away from checkmate.

“Ah,” Cas said, casting about for the appropriate words, “Congratulations, my lord. Will you be holding the wedding here or at the bride’s parish?”

“At the Pecklow Manor chapel. I will require you to read the banns starting next Sunday. My bride is eager to begin working on the succession.”

Cas kept his face smooth. Gresham spoke of his intended as if she were a broodmare, which he knew the upper class did at times, but it felt vile to stay silent.

“Very well. I will require the bride’s particulars. And do you wish me to perform the service?”

“Indeed.” Gresham handed him a folded piece of paper, “Here is the information you need. Her family has arranged the reading of the banns in her parish, and so we will wed in four week’s time. I trust this will not be trouble for you.”

Cas managed to say the appropriate things through the panic seizing his mind, and saw Gresham back out to his carriage. As the man stepped in, he paused.

“Vicar,” he said, “Are you unable to employ a servant?”

Cas paused, confused. “I am, my lord, but I prefer to do for myself in most things. The villagers all have their own concerns, as you know.”

Gresham smiled, but it did not reach his eyes. “You have the common touch, I see. A vicar of the people—even his cravat is simple." He laughed, brief and sharp. "Don’t forget that they are not the same as you and me. We who are chosen by birth must remember our place in the world.” He sank back into the cushioned seats of the carriage and rapped on the roof to alert the coachman.

Cas watched as the carriage drove away into the fading evening light. Gresham’s parting words felt like a threat, but of what, he could not imagine. The urgency of unseating the man, almost forgotten during his afternoon in the clearing, returned with greater force. Four weeks. He would not drag—he unfolded the paper Gresham had given him to find the name—Miss Jessica Moore through the scandal that revealing Gresham as an illegitimate son would cause. It would still damage her reputation, but not as badly as if she were married to the man.

Cas returned to the vicarage and placed the paper on his desk, rubbing his hands on his trousers to try to wipe off the feeling of being a part of this sordid business. Lying did not come easy to him, and Cas knew that he had lied to Gresham, if not in word, in his intent. He needed a bath, to wash off the stain that conversation had left on his skin, his soul.

As Cas pumped the first kettle of water and placed it over the fire, he stopped, frozen by a realization stabbing through him. _I don’t have to worry about Dean hurting me—I am about to hurt him in an unforgivable way._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back in yonder England times, if you wanted to get married without paying a bunch of money for a marriage license, you had to have the banns read at your local parish. It was supposed to give people time to raise legal/church reasons why a marriage should not take place.


	13. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Content note**: Some very vague descriptions of violence/abuse. 
> 
> Cas finds Dean and tells him the bad news. Dean reveals some more of his past. The Grand Revenge Process is back!

The rabbit had walked right into Dean’s snare. He tamped down the pang of sympathy for the creature as he quickly killed it. It had done nothing wrong, had only wanted to eat and live another day. Not hunting rabbits when they had young and giving the meat to Ellen went some way to soothing his guilt, but he felt he had more in common with the rabbit. Not even a few years ago he had killed without mercy, believed the world was ordered that way, but doubts had crept in the more time he spent observing creatures. The lingering soreness of his leg only made him feel worse.

“Dean.”

He turned quickly, knife out, ready for an attack. Cas stood so close that the knife was scant inches from his neck.

“Christ, Cas.” He lowered the knife. “I could have hurt you. Learn to make more sound as you creep up on people, for God’s sake.” He looked at Cas’s expression, one he hadn’t seen before. Cas looked awful, dark circles under his eyes, his mouth tight. Stubble shadowed his jaw. Dean’s stomach dropped. “What’s wrong?”

Cas shook his head, taking his hat off and running a hand through unkempt hair. “Dean…I, I don’t know how to tell you.”

Dean grabbed his shoulders, whether to steady Cas or shake him he didn’t know. “Is it Ellen? Joanna? Cas, you have to tell me.”

Cas met Dean’s gaze, despair plain in his shadowed eyes. “Dean,” he rasped out, “Gresham is going to marry.”

Dean nearly laughed with relief. “Is that all?” He drew Cas into an embrace. “I thought at least the tavern had burned down, you looked so grim.”

“No,” Cas pushed out of Dean’s arms. “You don’t see, do you? If Gresham weds, he will produce an heir, and if he does that…”

Dean's heart went cold. “The line continues. He will make another monster like himself, and ruin a woman’s life as well.”

“You know what he’s capable of?”

“Yes,” Dean shuddered. Cas reached out a hand tentatively, and Dean accepted the touch, leaning into it, savoring the small comfort.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t ask, but…”

“No, I want to…explain,” Dean said, taking a deep breath. “But can we go somewhere else?”

“Of course.” Cas looked at him, gaze steady, no judgment or impatience. “Lead the way.”

Dean reached out and clutched Cas’s hand. The other man still looked pale and distressed, but his grip was firm while Dean felt his own hand trembling. He led Cas beyond the boundaries of Pecklow Manor and onto common land, heading for a stream he had loved visiting as a boy. It fed into a small, still pool before racing on down the hill—as a boy he had gone to watch the tadpoles hatch each spring. Now the frogs were grown and gone, but the stream still sang and murmured as it made its way down toward the village. Cas looked around in recognition, his other hand trailing lightly over the bark of a white oak as if saying hello to a friend.

“You know this place?” Dean didn’t know how to start now that they had arrived. Cas nodded.

“I come here in the dragonfly nymphs are active. They eat other insect larvae, and the frogs eat the nymphs.” Dean wondered if Cas knew he was at a loss and was filling the silence, or if Cas was just that interested in his insects. It might be both, he realized, which made him smile.

“Here,” he tugged on Cas’s hand, leading them over to a fallen log surrounded by dead leaves. He sat on the leaves and leaned back on the log, and Cas sat down beside him. Cas moved as if to turn towards Dean, but Dean shook his head and squeezed Cas’s hand. He didn’t think he could tell this story if Cas could see his face, but he needed someone to touch him while he spoke.

“My father was not a good man, but he wanted to believe he was. When I was a child he would bring me to Pecklow Manor for tutoring, and Sam—Lucifer—would join.” Saying his half-brother’s name hurt. He rubbed his free hand over his heart. “He was so small and lonely, and I tried to take care of him as much as I could. The tutor was kind enough, but Lucifer needed a friend. I was that friend for a brief while, until our father realized that his heir looked up to me.”

Dean paused to take a breath, and Cas clasped his hand tighter. The other man didn’t say anything, but Dean felt his breaths slowing to match Cas’s. He focused on the sound of their slow inhales and exhales.

“I was only at the manor a few times a week, so he started spending more time with Lucifer, poisoning him against me. I don't know what he did, but it worked. He would call the tutor away, and then Lucifer would...hurt me. I couldn’t fight back—I felt pity for the boy and I knew that if I did fight, Gresham would do something to hurt my mother. So I took it silently. I tried to keep it a secret, but a wound turned bad and my mother took me to Ellen. You know Ellen, she could get a stone to talk. Between them they got the story out of me and I never went back.”

Dean heard Cas breathe in sharply, and turned to face him. “If you really want to know why I came back, it’s because I hoped he might be—that I could save him, I suppose.”

Cas’s eyes met his, and he shook his head. “We’re supposed to believe that anyone can change, but I don’t think Gresham will. At least not as long as he has the power of the title.”

Dean let out a shaky breath. “I don’t know what to do, Cas. He’s my brother, but he tried to kill me. I can’t let him have an heir, but I can’t, I won’t be Gresham.” His voice broke. Cas gathered Dean into his arms, and Dean let his head fall onto Cas’s shoulder.

Cas made soothing noises as he pressed his lips to Dean’s hair. The warm breath ghosting across his scalp, the arms strong around him, kept him from falling apart. He hoped Cas would not notice the damp spot he was leaving on the shoulder of his jacket. As he calmed, Cas said, “I didn’t know, Dean, I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”

Dean pulled back. “Don’t you dare pity me.”

“No,” Cas frowned, “That’s not what I’m saying. I’m sorry I asked you to do—to be Gresham.”

“What if it’s the only way?” His stomach clenched.

“We’ll find another way. Together.” Cas's eyes were focused, intent. _Honest_ , Dean thought.

Dean felt something unfurl in his chest. He felt suddenly lighter. “The Grand Revenge Process, then?” His voice still shook, but he managed a half-smile.

Cas smiled. “Yes,” he said, and pulled Dean into a kiss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise there will be more smooching soon. This ended up being angstier than I anticipated, so apologies.


	14. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I promised smooching, but Dean's too afraid of carriages to smooch in them. But there's a lot of discussion of smooching, so that's something.

The gig bounced over a rut in the road, and Dean gripped the side of the carriage even tighter. “I should have ridden my horse.”

Cas glanced sidelong at Dean and saw he was pale and sheened with sweat. He had been getting steadily worse throughout the drive. “If you had told me riding in carriages frightened you, I wouldn’t have made you come along. We talked about this. If I took my gig and you took your horse out on the same day, Gresham might suspect something.” Dean had slipped out of town on foot before daybreak that morning, and Cas had picked him up in his gig well outside of the village.

Dean swallowed hard. “You could have ridden behind me.”

“For twenty miles? I don’t think your horse would like that.” Cas looked closer at Dean’s face. The man did not look well at all. “Do you need me to stop?”

Dean shook his head. “That would only make this last longer.”

“Should I distract you?”

“You can try.” Dean’s voice rasped. Cas would have expected Dean to twist his words into an insinuation, but that was apparently beyond him at the moment. How strange, to be terrified of riding in a carriage.

“Very well, what is your horse’s name? You only ever call her ‘my horse.’”

Dean coughed, and Cas looked over to see if he was about to vomit over the side. But no, Dean was blushing. “It’s…I call her Baby.”

Cas stifled a laugh.

“No, go ahead and laugh.”

“It’s just, you’re so…I didn’t expect it, that’s all. How did she come by that name?”

“I kept meaning to sell her to someone who would appreciate what a fine horse she is, but I never could manage it. I finally realized it was because she was mine. Baby seemed like the right name.”

“Does Mrs. Harvelle know your horse’s name?”

“Yes, and she’s good enough not to tease me about it above once a month.”

“That is very kind of her,” Cas got out before giving up on holding in the laugh. Dean’s lips twitched.

“What do you call your horse?” Dean nodded at the bay roan pulling the gig.

“Luke.”

“You named your horse after a person?”

“You sold Josephina-Maria the First to that pair of women. Luke is a restrained choice by comparison,” Cas sniffed, earning a chuckle from Dean. “Besides, I don’t have a talent for naming things. It seems odd to use different names for different classes of creatures.”

“So, if you discovered a new insect, you would name it Susan? Or Jacob?”

Cas smiled. “You would be surprised at how many people name their discoveries after themselves, but they make it sound like Latin and pretend it’s not about self-congratulation.”

“So you would name it Castiel Novack, but all Latinified?”

“I don’t think I would. It seems very selfish.”

Dean shifted in the seat, hand still gripping the edge of the carriage so that his knuckles turned white.

“How much farther?”

“Not much. We’re nearing Suffalls, and Mrs. Harvelle said that Mr. Singer lives just outside the town.” They had decided to speak to Robert Singer, the witness to Dean’s mother’s marriage, and Mrs. Harvelle had told them what she knew of the former gamekeeper. “He’s not what I would call friendly,” she had said, “But he had a falling out with Old Gresham after the old devil did some bad thing or another, so I would dare say he’s a good man under it all. Whether he’ll speak with you long enough to let you see that is another question.”

The gig went over another large rut and Dean closed his eyes and muttered under his breath. Cas racked his brains for something to say. His thoughts landed on how Dean could turn anything into an insinuation. The man could take any innocent thing someone said and make it a flirtation. Dean would know what to do if he weren't so near panic. Could Cas manage it?

“What do you like?” The question tumbled out of his mouth before he could stop it. _So much for flirtation._

“What?”

“I mean,” Cas said, and could feel his face flushing, “what do you like to do when you’re…with someone?” He briefly considered leaping from the carriage, but that would only make Dean's panic worse.

“Oh.” Dean had opened his eyes and was now peering at Cas as if he had sprouted a pair of wings, “I’m, well, I’m usually better at showing than telling, but I don’t think you want me to do that on a public road.”

“No,” Cas said in as proper a tone of voice as possible. Dean was playing along, which boded well. “I don’t. But I do think that making you talk about it will keep your mind off the fact that we are hurtling down a country road in a two-wheeled carriage.”

Dean groaned. “Don’t remind me. I’ll try, although this feels like bloody torture, I’ll have you know. I’ll make you pay for this.”

Cas sniffed. “I don’t think so, Mr. Winchester. Now, speak.” He got the sense that Dean was enjoying this game even as he complained. He hoped that was true. Otherwise he was doing something very foolish indeed.

“Very well. I like…you know that I like kissing. Kissing is a good place to start.” Now Cas could see Dean was blushing too. Good, at least he had company in that. “I like it when someone touches my hair…I think you should take a turn now.”

Cas nodded, keeping his face solemn. “I like kissing too. I like holding someone’s head in my hands while I kiss them so that I can—direct, I suppose. It’s not about controlling the other person, but caring for them.” _You idiot. You're supposed to flirt, not bare your soul. “_ That probably sounds like nonsense.”

“No.” Dean’s voice was low and intense. “No, it makes sense.”

“Now you tell me something,” Cas said, clearing his throat. Flirting was hard, it turned out.

“I—I would like to let you take care of me, Cas.” The words sent a jolt straight through Cas’s gut. Dean continued, “I’ve always tried to be the person directing, as you said, but…”

“It gets tiring. But you can’t let go unless you feel safe.”

“Yes.” Dean’s voice had dropped almost to a whisper, but Cas could hear the tension vibrating through the words.

“Would you let me take you in my mouth?” Cas could scarcely believe he was saying these words out loud to another person. His university friendship had just happened, with little planning and even less conversation. They had just, _known_ somehow, silently negotiated what would happen, communicated through looks, touches, the occasional directive. Sitting next to someone, not touching, and talking—he felt like his heart might beat out of his chest at any moment.

“God, yes,” Dean groaned.

“Not God. Me.” Cas slanted a smile at Dean— _you smile when flirting, Cas—_ and his eyes went wide, pupils dilating.

Dean choked out a laugh. “Oh, you wouldn’t let me forget it, would you?”

“I take pride in my work.” That boldness from the clearing was returning and his voice gained strength.

“How would you start your work, then?”

Cas took a deep, shaky breath. “I would start with kissing, since we both like it. I would run my hands through your hair, cradle your head while I took your mouth.” He glanced over at Dean, who seemed to be struggling to breathe. “I would kiss my way along your jaw to where it meets your ear.” He took the reins in one hand—really, Luke needed little guidance on a good road—and traced his fingers along Dean’s jaw. The other man closed his eyes and bit his lower lip.

“I would kiss my way down your neck, untying your neckcloth so that I could run my fingers down your chest.” There was no way to untie Dean’s simple neckcloth with only one hand, so he simply trailed his fingertips over where the shirt would gape open if he did.

“I would wait until you got your shirt off, and then I would kiss my way down your chest. I would explore every freckle I found as I made my way down, down, and down.” Cas skipped his fingers down the expanse of Dean’s shirt. Dean was clutching the side of the carriage and the seat next to him hard, holding back, straining not to move.

“And when I reached your breeches, I would undo each button so slowly, so carefully, that…”

“Cas, if you don’t pull this damned carriage over right now I will die on the spot,” Dean said, his voice strained.

Just at that moment the carriage topped a small rise and the town of Suffalls spread out before them.

“Damn it.” Dean’s curse seemed ripped from his core.

Cas gave Dean a half smile. “I should probably tell you not to swear, but I’m inclined to agree.”

“We’re not done with this.” Dean reached over and grabbed Cas’s leg above the knee.

“I would hope not. We’ll finish our business here and, ah, continue this discussion later.”

Dean released Cas’s leg as they drove into the village. "I'm done with talking, Cas."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A gig is just a kind of carriage. It's really not that important.


	15. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I said there would be minimal angst, but Dean has a long of angst and anger. This chapter is mostly about Dean's Big Feelings.

Robert Singer cracked the door to his house open following Cas’s knock. “Who sent you?” he asked, eyes narrowed with suspicion.

Cas introduced himself and moved to the side so that Singer could see Dean. The man’s eyes widened when he caught sight of Dean, and he opened the door to step out.

“Dean Winchester, as I live and breathe,” he said, looking up at Dean’s face. Dean studied him—the man’s short beard and hair were graying, but something about his faded blue eyes and weather-roughened skin tugged at a memory—mist rising in the wood on an early morning, fishing poles resting on the side of the stream as it meandered through a flat meadow.

“Bobby?” Dean watched as the man’s face changed, the hard expression softening into something that was almost a smile.

“Dean, my boy, it is good to see you.” Singer clapped him on the shoulder, and Dean dared a half smile. “You’d best come in, you and this,” his face hardened again as he turned to look at Cas, “Mr. Novack.” Dean met Cas’s eyes and shrugged. They followed him into the poorly-lit house, picking their way around clutter as Singer led them to a table near the cooking hearth. Singer opened a bottle and splashed liquid into three cups, gesturing for them to sit.

Dean looked across at Cas, whose face was set in its usual mask. He hadn’t expected to see anything like disgust in the other man’s features, but he wished he had some insight into what Cas was thinking at this moment. He only seemed to unbend when they were alone and outside, letting expressions move across his features so freely that Dean had given up cataloguing them. His encyclopedia of Cas only applied when the other man felt he had to control what others saw. He was exercising tight control right now.

Dean looked into the rough earthenware cup in front of him, and his eyes watered at the vapors coming off the liquor. Singer took a drink from his own cup, eyes on Dean. Dean cleared his throat.

“Mr. Singer, I’m hoping, we’re hoping, that you might be able to tell us more about old Gresham and his…relationship with my mother.” Dean watched Singer closely as he spoke. The man’s eyes shifted between them, shrewd and wary.

“You,” Singer said, nodding at Dean, “can call me Bobby. It’s what you always called me before. And I ain’t telling you anything until you tell me what you know.”

Dean had expected this, but still stumbled over the narration of Cas’s discovery of the parish register and the engagement of the current Lord Gresham. Speaking the truth of his parentage made it more real, heavier. He could feel the viscountcy bearing down on him each time he spoke of it, and he longed to deny everything, to tell Bobby that their visit was only social. But Cas sat silently across from him, and he couldn’t lie.

Bobby let out a low whistle. “I should have known that Vicar Green would do something like that, the crafty old goat. He never trusted Gresham, and I wish I’d paid more attention to that.”

Dean glanced over at Cas, hoping to see something in his eyes or the set of his mouth that would show he knew how hard this was, how it was tearing at Dean’s heart to speak to this half-remembered man about his parents. But Cas remained impassive. Dean wanted to hit something.

“Can you tell me why?” Dean asked, resisting the urge to scratch at the burning in his chest.

Bobby slanted him a look. “Do you need me to tell you why? You knew Gresham. Hell, you half grew up with young Sam and saw what Gresham did with him. I’ll keep my own story to myself, thank you very much.”

Dean scrubbed a hand over his face. “Very well. Can you tell us anything that would prove that the current Lord Gresham is unfit for the title?”

“What would I know?” Bobby slammed his cup down on the table, and Dean sat back in his chair, and he saw Cas flinch out of the corner of his eye. “I’ve been gone for years, and I won’t get involved again.”

“Then please just tell me about my parents. I can’t figure out why he married my mother.” Dean held his hands up in a placating gesture, and Bobby’s anger burned out as quickly as it had come on. The man slumped back in his chair and ran a hand over his eyes.

“There’s not much to tell. She loved him—he wanted her. His father forbade the relationship, and so young John married her. I thought he might love her, but I came to believe he did it out of spite. When his father died and the time came to do his duty, he went off to London to find a society chit.”

Each word stabbed Dean a little bit deeper, and his own anger started to rise. He hadn’t realized until that moment that he had held out hope for—what has Cas said back in the clearing? A grand romance, some proof that old Gresham had not been the monster he had seen as a child, that he was the product of something besides a callous disregard for his mother’s feelings, her life. He could not take revenge on his dead father, so he focused his anger on the older man sitting at the table.

“And you did nothing? You didn’t say what you knew, that he was already wed?” His voice was getting louder, he could hear it gaining force, but he felt as if he were holding back the fury of a storm coming off of the North Sea, like his rage could shatter the walls of the cottage and lay waste to the countryside. This pathetic drunk sitting in front of him had done nothing, had stood by while his mother had suffered and then died, all so that a rich man could get what he wanted. “You stood by while my mother slowly died because of what that bastard did. You watched while he tried to destroy _me_.”

Bobby stood up so quickly that his chair clattered to the floor. His face was red, and he clenched his hand in a fist. “Don’t you dare judge me, boy. He threatened my wife, and I wasn’t going to find out if he meant it.” They stared at each other, breathing hard. Dean gripped the edge of the table to keep himself from punching something, or worse, someone.

“We’re done here.” Cas’s voice broke through the tension. Dean heard the scrape of Cas’s chair as he stood up. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Singer. I see we’ve overstayed our welcome.” He felt Cas grip his arm, and let himself be led out the door back into the sunshine. He moved stiffly, rage making his muscles tense. He could not even decide who to be angry with—his father, Bobby, his mother, himself. Cas. Cas, who had sat there in that dark and dirty cottage, Cas, who had done nothing to support Dean as a man who should have helped refused to. He turned on Cas as they reached the gig.

“What the hell was that in there?” 

Cas took a step back, blinking. Dean followed, crowding him against the side of the vehicle.

“I don’t—what?”

“You just sat there while he, while I—you just _sat there_.” He didn’t know whether he wanted to tear the carriage apart with his bare hands or weep.

“It was clear that he wasn’t going to help. That man was ruined by Gresham—I saw it the moment he started to talk. He wasn’t going to help.”

Damn Cas and his calm tone, damn him and his logic. Dean turned on his heel and started walking down the lane to the road. He had just turned onto the road when he heard the hoofbeats of Cas’s horse and the rattle of the gig behind him.

“Dean, please get in. You can’t walk all the way back.” Cas still sounded calm, and fuck him seventy ways to hell for that.

“I’ve walked farther.” He kicked a stone.

“I’m sure you have.” Cas was keeping his horse to a walk.

“Leave me alone.”

“No.”

Dean gave up on trying to convince Cas of anything, and kept walking. The gig stayed behind him, Cas’s horse occasionally getting close enough that Dean could feel its breath on his neck. Dean felt the anger simmering in his blood, but he also felt his leg growing tired and sore as miles passed.

“You’re limping,” Cas said, pulling the carriage to a stop beside him. “Please, Dean, get in.”

Dean felt something ugly twist in his gut as he stared up at Cas, who deigned to look mildly concerned.

“Fuck. You.”

Cas looked back at him, face inscrutable as always. _What a prick._

“You just sat there while Bobby,” Dean spat out the name, “told me that he was too lily-livered to hold my father accountable. Do you know? He used to take me fishing when I was a boy. He saw the bruises, he knew what was happening. And he did nothing. And you didn’t do anything today either. You wanted me to be Gresham, and you pushed me into all of this, and then you just sat there today.” Some part of his mind knew he wasn’t being fair, that he was blaming Cas for more than he could ever be responsible for, but the world wasn’t fair, and right now he felt powerful shouting at the quiet man beside him.

“You cared more about what you thought my duty was than what I wanted.” A sudden realization struck him. It had been lurking at the edge of his thoughts, but he hadn’t been able to pin it down until this moment. “You’re obsessed with duty, always talking about it and about finding your place in the world. And I know why.” He advanced toward the carriage and gripped Cas’s sleeve, pulling him off balance and making the horse shift in its harness. “It’s because you’re trying to convince yourself that being a vicar is your calling, but you know it isn’t, so you try to make everyone else miserable.”

Cas pulled back, his face pale, expression stricken. Dean turned on his heel and stalked off the road into the fields, keeping his legs stiff so that his limp wouldn’t show. Cas didn’t call out or try to stop him, and when Dean turned to look back at the road before entering a hedgerow, the gig was gone, the road empty and silent. “Oh, so you’re abandoning me, now?” he shouted into the empty landscape. Not even an echo came back, his words falling heavy into the earth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise I'll pull out of the angst spiral soon!


	16. Dean (again)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Angst gets (mostly) resolved. Cas discovers what happened to his cravat. Things get smoochy.

Dean sat in a chair by the fire, his leg propped on a stool, and hated himself. He had spent many evenings this way, at least when he couldn’t get his hands on enough ale to forget, but it had been several weeks since his last bout of thorough self-loathing. Cas had changed that, his belief that Dean was good, his rare smiles, his intoxicating flashes of passion all working together to make Dean hope—for what, he didn’t know, but he had felt he could look forward for once. He had hoped, and he had gone and destroyed it all because an old man hadn’t cared enough about him to save him from a lord twenty years ago.

Dean had given up on stomping across fields and returned to the road after his leg had started to pain him in earnest. His anger had snuffed out abruptly after that first mile of walking alone, leaving behind a cold certainty that he was worse than old Gresham, worse than Lucifer, worse even than the devil he was named after. A fallen branch had served as a cane, and every painful step felt like an act of penance. Except penance was supposed to lead to forgiveness, absolution, and Dean deserved neither.

So now he sat in his chair by the fire, leg painful and weak, and let the familiar hatred burrow into his gut. He held Cas’s cravat tightly in his hands. A brief flare of anger had propelled him to grab it and toss it in the fire when he saw it hanging over the frame of his bed, but he had paused before he could hurl it into the flames and now clutched it like a talisman against the looming darkness both outside and in his soul. He’d stolen it from Cas that day in the clearing, wanting something to remember that day by, and he had slept with it hanging beside his head ever since, imagining that he could catch Cas’s scent, a mix of plain soap, sunshine, and…something deep and secret and wild. He had lain awake at night trying to name it, chasing the scent down through his memories. He had traveled the length and breadth of the country, and the scent on that cravat tugged at something in Dean, but he never could make his mind take that final step from unformed idea to word. He wrapped the cloth around a fist and pressed it to his lips.

The door banged open and Dean turned toward the sound. Cas was striding in, slamming the door behind him, coming up to Dean with anger burning in his eyes.

“Damn it, Dean, are you all right?”

Dean blinked up at him. Cas’s voice had dropped low and sounded fierce, but the question was all concern and fear.

“Yes,” he managed to get out. “I’m—“

Cas crouched down and grabbed Dean’s shoulders, shaking him. “I turned back, I came back to look for you, but you weren’t on the road anymore. I thought you were dead. Or hurt, or—“

“No, Cas. I’m here. I’m safe,” Dean said as he gripped Cas’s arms. “And Cas, you have no idea…” But Cas interrupted him, standing up and shaking off Dean’s hold to pace before the fire.

“Dean, I failed you. I took you on an errand that only caused you pain, and I didn’t step in sooner. All I have is regret. I _failed_.” He turned away, his hands on his head, and his voice broke. “When I thought you were dead…I wish I had gotten out and followed you, but I was only making everything worse." He stood silent for a moment, frozen, then added in a monotone, "I only came here to make sure you were safe and to tell you that I’m sorry. I’ll leave and not come back.”

“Wait, Cas!” Dean surged up from the chair, stumbling toward the door to block Cas’s exit. “No, I mean yes, I needed your help today, but I was in the wrong too.” Cas shook his head, refusing to look at Dean, so he captured Cas’s face in his hands and tilted the other man’s head up so he could see his eyes. “I was angry with my father, with Bobby, and yes, with you, but you I can forgive. The rest of them can go to hell.”

Cas’s eyes glinted in the firelight. “But you trusted me, Dean. And I didn’t saved you this time.” Dean touched his forehead to Cas’s, breath shaky.

“You’re just a man, Cas. You can’t always save people.”

Cas closed his eyes, and Dean had to strain to hear him whisper, “But I want to.” The air from those words brushed against Dean’s lips, and he stroked Cas’s cheeks with his thumbs.

“How about next time, we have a—a word, or a signal that I can give you if I need help. Something like ‘pork pie’ or, or…” He paused as Cas let out a breath and brought his arms up and around Dean’s back. Their noses bumped and pressed together.

“Yes. Pork pie, I can remember that.” Cas still had his eyes closed. “But Dean, I’m so sorry.” Something caught in Dean's throat at the sound of Cas's voice. He blinked away the moisture in his eyes.

“I’m sorry too,” Dean said, and pressed a kiss to Cas’s forehead. “Please, I don’t deserve it, but please—“

Cas cut him off by pulling him down into a kiss.

Dean had rocketed from one feeling to the next all day, from fear to lust, to anger to despair, and now to something raw and jagged and so, so bright that he closed his eyes against it though the light was inside. He let Cas pull him to the low, simple bed and fell onto it, limbs tangled up with Cas, embracing and embraced in the same moment. He opened his eyes to meet Cas’s gaze, so close that he could see the border between the icy blue of an iris and the dark well of a blown pupil. The intensity of that look, the intimacy made his heart race so fast that he closed his eyes again, afraid what Cas would see if he didn’t put up that small barrier.

Cas tugged at Dean’s neckcloth and it fell away. Dean arched up into Cas as the man dropped kisses along the line of his jaw and over to his ear, biting lightly at the soft spot where jaw ended and neck began. Dean pressed Cas to him, held his head to him as Cas’s hands moved up into Dean’s hair, gripping hard to keep Dean’s head still. A moan broke free from Dean’s throat at the feel of Cas exploring the lines in neck, the places where tendons stood hard against skin as Dean panted and arched and begged. He opened his eyes when Cas reared back, reveling in how wild and undone the man looked. His dark hair stood up on end where Dean had raked his fingers through it, his lips were swollen and red, his chest rising and falling fast as he looked down at Dean.

“Shirt. Off,” Cas said, and Dean reached down to pull his shirt over his head, but Cas caught one hand in his own. “Is that…my cravat?” He brought Dean’s hand up to look more closely at the cloth still wrapped around Dean’s fist. Dean nodded.

Cas turned Dean’s hand over, and unwound the cloth before pressing a kiss to the palm, his lips feathering over the sensitive skin until Dean thought he might combust. “I was wrong, then,” Cas said, and bit down on the flesh at the base of Dean’s thumb. “You are a wicked man, stealing a vicar’s cravat. Where did you keep it?” Cas was now trailing kisses across each finger on Dean’s hand. “With your clothes, so you could look at it as you dressed yourself? Behind your books, where no one would look?” Dean tried to rock his hips up into where Cas was straddling him, but Cas backed away. “Or,” he fixed Dean with a heavy-lidded stare, “did you keep it here in your bed?”

Dean tried to sit up, to catch Cas’s mouth with his own, but Cas pushed him back down, leaning over him. “Tell me, Dean.” Dean moaned and gave up, nodding. “No, tell me.”

“Yes,” Dean gasped, and Cas rewarded him with a kiss, his tongue claiming Dean’s mouth.

“Keep it,” Cas said, breaking off the kiss to tug Dean’s shirt over his head. He dropped his head to Dean’s chest, kissing a path, pausing occasionally to explore a spot with teeth and tongue and fingers. Dean looked down to see…Cas keeping his promise. He had said he would explore every freckle, and by God, he seemed intent on doing that now. It was going to kill him.

“Cas,” he panted, “You don’t have to do exactly what you said earlier.”

“I don’t,” Cas raised his head, one side of his mouth kicking up in a smile, “but I want to.” He bent his head back to his task of mapping Dean’s body with kisses, strokes, and gentle bites. Dean finally gave up the struggle and lay there, taking what Cas was giving, growing frantic and incoherent by the time Cas reached the trouser buttons.

And suddenly it was too much, too bright as Cas stripped away that final barrier and swallowed him down. The world went white and all Dean could do as Cas stroked and sucked and groaned around him was say, “Cas, Cas, Cas,” until the pleasure crested and he fell apart.


	17. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I blushed the whole time I was working on this chapter. **runs and hides** Things get more explicitly smoochy.

“What are you thinking?” Cas asked as he sifted Dean’s light hair through his fingers.

“I’m…not,” Dean replied, sounding tired and a little drunk. He rolled to his side and examined Cas’s face. “That was—you were—I guess you do take pride in your work.”

Cas laughed and turned his head to capture Dean’s mouth in a swift kiss. “I wouldn’t lie to you.” He felt a little drunk himself, the heady feeling of having seen Dean lose control fizzing in his blood. But worry gnawed at the edges of that emotion. “Dean.”

The other man frowned at the tone in Cas’s voice. He did rather sound like he were speaking at a funeral, he supposed. “It’s not an excuse, but I need to explain what happened today.” He forced himself to look Dean in the eyes as he continued. “I panicked. I didn’t know what to say or how to say it, and I couldn’t stop thinking that whatever I could say would make things worse. I don’t always know how to respond when things go differently than I imagined.” Dean tried to interrupt, but Cas shook his head and raised himself up on an elbow. “Now that we have a signal, that will help, but maybe we could, perhaps, practice before we do something like this again?”

He waited for Dean to respond. The silence stretched and he forced himself not to interrupt.

“Cas,” Dean finally said, half-rising to meet Cas’s gaze on equal footing. “I’ll do whatever you want, but I should be the one apologizing. I didn’t think—“ he broke off with a quick, mirthless laugh, “—I never think, it seems, before I go off and do or say something I’ll regret later. I should never have said that you aren’t a vicar or that you failed. You panicked. Everyone does. Just because I hated myself back there doesn’t meant I had to try to drag you down with me.”

Cas’s chest felt tight, fear and hope fighting each other as he considered what to say next. “But the thing is,” he forced out at last, “I think you were right.”

“What?” Dean sat all the way up. “Right about what?”

“I don’t think I am a vicar,” Cas said slowly, his thoughts coalescing and becoming clearer as he spoke. “I do my duty, I follow the rules, but I think that’s all it is.”

Dean smiled and tapped the center of Cas’s chest. “I hate to deliver the bad news, Mr. Novack, but you definitely broke several rules just a few minutes ago. And at the stream. And in the meadow.”

Cas frowned. “But those are bad rules.”

Dean laughed and tumbled Cas back down onto the mattress. “Do you have a system for determining which rules are and aren’t worth following?”

Cas pressed his hands against Dean’s chest, creating enough separation that he could think. “I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about what you said half the day, and I realized a few things. I don’t care nearly enough when people miss services. I was never bothered by you taking the Lord’s name in vain. I never feel transported by the beauty of a service or a prayer.”

Dean fell onto the bed beside Cas and groaned, covering his face with his hands. “So I _did_ ruin you.”

“No, no,” Cas sat up and tugged Dean’s hands away to look into his eyes, but then saw Dean was laughing. He gave Dean an exaggerated frown. “You, sir, are a wicked, cravat-stealing, lying man, and it would serve you right if I never spoke to you again.”

“Oh, we don’t need to speak.” Dean pulled Cas down onto his chest. He rocked his hips up, and Cas gasped at the sensation. “And you were very good to me just now. I’d like to return the favor.”

“It was no favor,” Cas said, breathing hard as Dean ran his fingers lightly over his sides and back.

“Well, then, do me a favor now and get out of these clothes,” Dean said and tugged on Cas’s jacket sleeve. “You have the advantage of me.”

Working together, they wrestled Cas out of his jacket, shirt, and trousers, but Cas kept Dean’s hand from undoing his smalls. “Wait,” he rasped. He’d ended up straddling Dean, and he leaned down to press a gentle kiss to his lips. “I want to please you too. I can’t—I don’t want this to just be about me.”

“What are you asking for, Cas?” Dean met his eyes without blinking, without shame. But he also didn't help by saying the words Cas was thinking.

“I’m asking,” Cas said, his heart beating wildly against his ribs as if he were standing on the edge of a cliff, nothing to break his fall, “if I can fuck you.”

Dean’s breath caught, his head tilting back as he groaned. “God, Cas, if you’re going to talk like that I’m not going to last even a minute.” He surged up, lips meeting Cas’s in a rough, desperate kiss. Cas felt it in his heart—Dean would allow this, would trust Cas to take care of him. Cas let himself go heavy, pressing Dean down into the bed. He heard Dean fumble with something beside the bed, and then a vial of oil was pressed into his hands. He broke off the kiss to press his forehead to Dean’s.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes,” Dean panted out, “And if you don’t fucking hurry I’ll go mad.” Hands pulled at Cas’s smalls and he worked them down and off his legs. He slowed when he returned to Dean’s side, stroking his face, his neck, his chest, the curve of his arse. He felt more awake, more present, than he ever had in that moment. But the world grew even sharper when Dean made an impatient sound and removed the bottle’s stopper. Cas worked slowly, opening Dean up with fingers and wicked words whispered between kisses. He paused when he had fit himself against Dean’s entrance, but Dean was done with waiting and rocked up into Cas, taking everything. They paused, trading shaky breaths between them, and Cas found Dean’s hand with his own, lacing their fingers together. After a few moments, the urge to move became too strong to deny, and they found a rocking rhythm. Words became gasps, gasps became helpless moans, and when Cas felt Dean coming, heard his name tumbling from Dean’s lips, he followed him over the edge.

Cas floated in a haze of contentment for what was probably minutes, but felt like hours. He only stirred when he felt Dean shifting off the mattress and reached out, groping for Dean’s hand. “Shh,” Dean leaned over and dropped a kiss on his forehead. “You took care of me, so now I get to take care of you.” The bed still felt empty and lonely until Dean returned with a wet cloth and cleaned the sweat and mess from his skin. Cas cracked open one eye to watch as Dean banked the fire and came back to the bed to slide in next to him. Cas turned to his side and threw an arm over Dean, drawing him close. Sleep pulled him under, the sound of Dean’s even, deep breaths like the sound of waves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Smalls is just an old-time word for underwear.


	18. Cas (again)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean sings a bawdy song. Cas gets thisssssss close to confessing his true feelings. Anna is coming for a visit.

Cas woke to the sound of Dean stirring the fire and hanging a kettle over it. He kept his breaths even and slow, wanting to soak in the warmth of the bed and spend a few more moments with the bone-deep contentment he felt before returning to the problems outside the cottage walls. Dean was humming a tune, and Cas turned his face into the pillow to hide a smile. When Dean felt safe, Cas was discovering, he was light-hearted, something he had never suspected in his months of observing Dean about his business. Cas’s smile grew wider—he could now admit to himself that he hadn’t just watched Dean out of curiosity or to determine his suitability for the title. No, he had watched Dean because of selfish desire. He probably should repent, or feel guilty, but that selfishness warmed him.

Cas felt Dean’s lips skim across his shoulder. “I know you’re awake.” Dean’s breath brushed against the spot he had kissed, and Cas rolled over to watch Dean make his way back over to the fire. He had put on trousers and a shirt against the morning chill, but Cas knew the lines of Dean’s body now and could track them under the roughly-woven cloth.

“What’s that song? I’ve heard the tune before, I think.”

Dean turned and positively leered before singing:

 _Tis sweeter far than sugar fine,  
_ _And pleasanter than muscadine;  
_ _And if you please, fair sir, to stay  
_ _A little while, with me to play,  
_ _I will give you the same,  
_ _Watkin’s ale called by name_

Cas felt his face heating, and he sputtered out a breath. “You’re singing about _semen_?”

Dean laughed and threw Cas’s clothes onto the bed. “If you’re going to go all stuffy on me, I can stop.”

Cas did not know how he could seem stuffy when he was naked in another man’s bed, but he felt the need to preserve his dignity, and protested, “You changed the words.”

Dean shrugged. “I didn’t think that a fair maid was likely to wander in through the door at this hour. Or any hour.”

Cas muttered darkly, “Good,” as he dressed himself, moving quickly because of the cold.

Dean draped an arm over Cas’s shoulder when he reached the fire. “Is that jealousy?”

Cas felt his face heat even more. “I shouldn’t admit to it, but yes.”

“Ah, so you have heard about my reputation.”

“Not much. I’m not supposed to pay attention to gossip, but it’s difficult to avoid in a village this small.”

Dean turned Cas to face him, and Cas wished his face weren’t so flushed. It made him feel naive to be embarrassed, a little jealous, and uncertain about how to have this sort of conversation.

“Cas, it’s fine to wonder. Believe me, I have wondered plenty about your university friend.”

“But I told you everything important.”

“I wasn’t wondering about what you told me—I was wondering what you _didn’t_ tell me. At one point I pictured you wearing spectacles and nothing else as you did truly wicked and athletic things with your friend.”

“Oh.” Cas’s voice sounded faint, even to his own ears. “But I don’t wear spectacles.” This conversation had gotten away from him. He was clinging to whatever bits of reason remained in his skull.

“A man can dream. But—“ Dean stroked a thumb across Cas’s cheek, “If you’re wondering if I’ll pretend not to know you next week and be in someone else’s bed, don’t. You’re the only person I’ve been withsince I returned. The men and women of Lawrence-in-the-Vale are safe from me.”

“All but one.” Cas gathered his courage and dropped a quick kiss on Dean’s lips.

“Is that so?”

Cas looked into Dean’s eyes. Was that uncertainty on the other man’s face?“I haven’t been safe from you the moment you set foot in the village.” Cas knew that for him, this was as good as a declaration of undying love, but Dean might not understand. He promised himself that he would work out the words for it soon, but for now, those would have to do.

Dean smiled. “I suppose I should tell you, then, that I knew you were dangerous the moment I laid eyes on you. Maybe not consciously, but I’ve been thinking, and I spent more time wondering about you and if you could grow a beard than anyone should if they are not attracted to them.”

Cas trapped Dean’s hand against his cheek and felt Dean’s palm scrape along the stubble there. “Why the obsession with my beard?”

Dean absently stroked his fingers along Cas’s jaw. “You looked…too perfect without a beard. Untouchable. I wanted to see something that proved you were just a man like me. A man who might like me.”

Cas shook his head. “Of course I’m a man, Dean. And I do like you. Very much.”

Dean grinned down at him with mischief in his eyes. Cas now knew that signaled an end to this sincerity.

“I know you like my Watkin’s ale,” Dean said and danced away before Cas could cuff him on the shoulder.

“Good God, man, if you’re going to talk like that I will leave and pray for your soul,” he laughed and then sobered. “But I should be on my way. I’ve been neglecting my duties horribly, and I am to help Mrs. Brown clean the vicarage today. I received a letter from my sister saying that she intends to visit.”

Dean stilled, his face stone. “Oh?”

“Yes. I wrote to her to ask what she knew about Miss Jessica Moore, and she sent a brief reply saying that if I were writing to her about gently bred young ladies, I was clearly in need of a visit.”

“Oh.”

Cas looked at Dean, puzzled. “Have I done something wrong? I thought that we should attack the problem from all angles, and if we could somehow warn off Miss Moore or get her to break the engagement, that would give us more time to find a permanent solution. My sister will be helpful, I’m sure.”

“I see. Will you send me reports of your conversations, or should I expect not to see you until she leaves?”

Cas was once again thoroughly confused. “No. I expected to have you over for tea at least, but I would like to see you more often.” 

At these words, Dean relaxed a little. “And does she know…?”

“That I like men? Yes. That’s why she’s rushing down here—I must have accidentally given her the impression that I wish to marry Miss Moore. I always have trouble conveying my exact meaning in letters. She is probably bent on saving me from the altar and will be greatly relieved to meet you.”

“Oh.” This time Dean sounded almost—awed—was the only word Cas could think of. “It’s,” Dean cleared his throat, “nice that you have someone who accepts that part of you.”

“My parents are dead, and Anna never seemed to mind. They only ever minded that I didn’t seem to think or behave the way they expected.”

“I’m sorry for that.”

Cas shrugged. It was an old hurt. And he wondered, now, if Anna had truly minded that he was different than her—less prone to fly off in a passion, less intuitive, needing things explained. _Maybe she minded that I wasn’t happy and didn’t know what to do_. The thought felt true as it coalesced. Anna was indeed only two years older than him, and could not have done much to help even if he had known what sort of help he would have wanted or needed.

“She is supposed to arrive tomorrow. Would you join us for supper?”

“I will,” Dean said has he drew Cas into an embrace. “Should I promise to use my most polished manners?”

Cas pulled away, laughing. “I think she’ll surprise you, Dean.” He ignored Dean’s questioning glance, and left the cottage, the chill pre-dawn mist barely registering as he walked down the lane humming a tune. For once, he was looking forward to a family visit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Watkin's Ale is a truly dirty song from the Elizabethan era (so...not Regency, but a song about semen is timeless?), and you can read about the song and listen to it here: https://the-toast.net/2013/10/11/a-really-dirty-song-from-the-english-renaissance/


	19. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anna arrives. Dean is slightly befuddled by her. Anna schemes.

Dean had just raised his hand to knock on the vicarage door when Cas opened. it.

“That eager to see me?” Dean kept his tone light, but his heart beat fast and he could feel sweat coating his palms. Old Gresham had forced a few lessons in manners onto Dean when he had been summoned to Pecklow as a child, but those lessons had not covered how to behave when meeting the sister of the vicar you were shagging. Cas looked equally nervous, which was a small comfort. He wore his stuffiest suit and an impossibly crisp cravat.

“Dean, come in,” Cas said, opening the door and gesturing. Oh Christ, was Cas going to have a stick up his arse all evening? Dean brushed his hand over the curve of Cas’s hip as he passed—in no world would he let Cas pretend they had not seen each other naked. Dean smiled when he heard Cas stumble slightly as he followed Dean into the house.

The sitting room was just as small and suffocating as it had been before, but the ethereal creature sitting on a chair inside of it brought light and color to the room. Dean paused a moment as he took in the woman, her auburn hair and translucent complexion set off perfectly by a gown of rich, dark green. She managed to lounge in the stiff and upright chair and swirled a glass of amber liquid in one hand.

Dean executed a passable bow—he had at least retained that—as Cas made introductions, but then jerked his head to look at Cas when he introduced his sister as Lady Milton.

“Did my brother fail to mention my rank?” Anna asked, arching a single, perfect eyebrow. “Don’t fear—I won’t bite. And I’d rather you called me Anna. I gained my title through nefarious means.”

Dean relaxed a touch, but did not sit until Cas practically pushed him into a chair. Cas went to the small sideboard, and Dean nodded when Cas indicated the bottle of whiskey. Anna drew his attention back and continued, “If he didn’t tell you that, he most certainly did not tell you that our mother was the daughter of a duke and our father a renegade prince.”

Dean choked on the whiskey.

“Anna, please. I’d rather you didn’t kill him.” Cas fixed his sister with a frown. Anna grinned.

“In Cas’s defense, he said your father was a noble,” Dean managed to get out, “but the Continent is so full of nobles that I assumed he was…minor.” Cas at least had the grace to flush.

“That is our beloved Cas, always modest. Now, I don’t give a fig about titles, but I’m not above using mine when it suits me.”

Dean could only nod, scarce believing that Cas and Anna shared blood. They were so different—where Cas was serious, Anna laughed. Cas followed rules, and Anna was drinking whiskey and asking someone like him to use her first name. He would have been in danger of falling in love with her if he hadn’t already fallen for Cas, he thought, and then froze. Cas. Love. Those two words went together too easily.

“And how is Lord Milton?” he asked to turn his mind away from the dangerous subject of feelings.

“Dead,” Anna said and sipped her whiskey. “A ‘youthful indiscretion,’ I think the society dames would call it. We eloped when I was twenty, and he died in a curricle race not a year later.” She tilted her head to the side as she finished this speech, and Dean caught a glimpse of Cas in that gesture. So, the siblings did share something besides an angelic sort of beauty.

“I was sad, of course,” Anna said, “but not being married suits me much better. Lord Milton was a dear, but we quickly discovered we were not a good match.”

Dean looked over at Cas, expecting to see him wearing his puzzled frown or even a look a of censure, but the other man looked relaxed, even happy.

“Oh, have I shocked you?” Anna leaned forward and rested her hand on Dean’s forearm. “Cas told me all about you when I interrogated him after arriving, so I feel as if I know you already. Forgive me if I speak too freely.”

“Anna, you share so many of your thoughts that I suspect all of London knows your feelings about your brief marriage.” Cas rolled his eyes as he looked at Dean, and Dean smothered a laugh. Cas was— _teasing_ his sister.

Dean cleared his throat and said, “No my lady, I mean, Anna. I just expected someone more Cas-Like, I suppose.”

“I can be serious, if that is what you mean. I'm in unusually good spirits today now that I know my little brother is not about to sacrifice himself on the hymeneal altar.” She studied Dean for a moment, her hazels eyes sharp. “I think you’ll do nicely.”

“Anna,” Cas sputtered, “Please. You’ll frighten him away.”

“Oh, he isn’t frightened. And he won’t have a reason to be unless he does something idiotic like break your heart.” Dean felt his own face heating now, and looked at Cas wide-eyed, pleading for help of some sort. Anna was unstoppable, it seemed.

“Oh good,” she said, “I made you both blush. Now that we’ve got that over with, can we leave this dreadful room and eat?”

The conversation grew easier over a simple supper of roasted fish and root vegetables, and Dean gave silent thanks that Anna had ceased buttonholing him. Anna told Dean a series of anecdotes about Cas as a child that made Cas blush some more, but Dean sensed that Cas enjoyed the sisterly attention. Anna’s affection for Cas was clear, even if her very different temperament meant she didn’t always understand him.

“I am not returning to that sitting room,” Anna said at the end of the meal. “I will go get the whiskey while you two clean up, and then we’ll have a cozy discussion of tactics in the kitchen.” She breezed out of the dining room before either Dean or Cas could say something.

“Is she always like this?” Dean whispered at Cas as they collected the plates and silverware.

“When she’s happy, yes,” Cas whispered back. “She has always had strong sensibilities. She is quite—philosophical, if not flippant, about her late husband’s death now, but she was devastated at the time. I came home from university to be with her, though I don’t think I did much.”

Dean nudged Cas with his hip as they made their way to the kitchen since his hands were full. “I think you are underestimating yourself.”

Anna was waiting for them in the kitchen, another glass of whiskey in front of her and the bottle and a glass set out for Dean. Cas started to make tea, something he had refused to let Dean do after a regrettable incident with an over-brewed pot, and Dean quickly washed the dishes. When they sat at the table, Anna began.

“I was surprised when Cas wrote me about Miss Moore. Not,” she shot a look at Cas, “only because I worried he was about to do something foolish, but also because the Moores have become rather unfortunate subjects of gossip recently. Word has gotten out that her father, a baronet more famous for his wealth than good breeding, has depleted the family coffers in the most scandalous way.”

None of what she said meant anything to Dean. People ruined themselves financially every day, and there was nothing particularly scandalous about it. Cas looked nonplussed as well. Anna shook her head at both of them.

“I forget, Dean has not had a chance to move about in society, and you haven’t been in London in years.” She looked at Cas, and her liveliness dimmed a bit. “Despite my invitations, I might say.”

Cas shifted uncomfortably. “I don’t like the city,” he said to the table. Anna covered one of Cas’s hands with her own.

“I know, brother. And I could come to the country more, but I much prefer the crowds.” She sighed before recollecting herself and continuing. “Sir Moore, it seems, lost the family fortune through some of the usual methods—gambling, financial schemes. But he also kept a company of opera dancers as a sort of…collection of mistresses, let us say. He engaged in the usual debaucheries, but he also spent thousands of pounds outfitting them—“ she leaned forward and dropped her voice, “—as popes and cardinals. The combined force of licentious behavior and popishness has thrown the family from high society into disgrace. They desperately need money, but not even the wealthier mercantile families will come near them.”

“But Lucifer will,” Dean said, understanding dawning. “He’s buying a bride, and her family won’t let her out of the marriage because there won't be any other offers."

Anna nodded and sat back, draining her glass. Dean followed suit and looked over at Cas, who stared into his teacup as if it might hold a clue as to what they should do next. Dean nudged him with a foot under the table, knowing it couldn't convey his feelings, but needed Cas to meet his gaze. Cas looked up, and Dean saw despair in his eyes.

“There’s only one way to stop him, Dean,” Cas said, his voice quiet and tense. Dean's heart sank. Part of him had known this was coming, had known there was only one way, but he couldn’t keep a flash of anger form jolting through him. Cas reached out and grabbed Dean’s hand, and Dean could feel how cold it was.

“Stop looking tragic, the both of you.” Anna slammed her glass on the table, making them both jump. “The minute Cas told me about the register and your hatred of the title, I began to scheme.” She looked at Cas. “My brother likes to think that if he can’t find a solution to something, the problem must be impossible, but that’s only because he doesn’t have me around to tell him otherwise.”

Cas started to protest, but she silenced him with an imperious wave of her hand. “Now, listen to me. I’m about to perform a miracle.” And with that, she laid out the beginnings of a plan.


	20. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Deleted and re-added because I accidentally posted a rough draft.** Anna plays matchmaker. Cas takes a risk.

Cas tugged at his cravat, wishing he could strip it off and go hide in Dean’s cottage. Now that Anna’s plan was in motion, though, he had to spend whatever time he wasn’t tending to the church and its parishioners writing a flurry of letters. At least Anna had taken charge of writing ahead to Weston’s of Bond Street with Dean’s measurements—Cas felt unequal to that task. Instead, he wrote letters to nobles long-known to his family, others to attorneys in London to arrange introductions and inquire about their services, and yet others to the skeleton staff at the house in Mayfair he liked to pretend he didn’t own.

Anna had disabused Dean of whatever lingering illusions he had about Cas being a simple country vicar with brutal efficiency over a series of suppers. Cas hadn’t had a minute alone with Dean, what with the planning, the letters, and Cas arranging for another vicar to step in while they were away, and he looked forward to seeing Dean in private with mixed anticipation and fear. Cas missed Dean terribly, though he saw the other man every day, but he had seen Dean’s face when Anna had revealed the existence of the house in town and their family’s wealth. Dean was angry, or hurt, or both, or something else altogether.

The opening of the vicarage door alerted Cas to Dean’s arrival. He laid down his latest letter, this one requesting a meeting with the Lord Chancellor, now on its third draft. He rose from his chair, muscles aching from holding one position for so long, and made his way slowly to the kitchen. Anna had forbidden any further attempts at formality after that first supper, and he was relieved. He always thought of her as a woman of society, sometimes forgetting that Anna had been rebellious from the start—Cas was learning, but she was years ahead.

Dean was already sitting at the table with Anna, laughing over some shared joke, but he looked up when Cas came into the room, his smile disappearing, eyes sharp. Cas swallowed.

“Oh,” Anna looked around and smiled when she saw Cas. “I’m glad to see you could tear yourself away from your writing desk, brother.”

Cas barely heard her, his eyes on Dean. The mixture of desire and trepidation swirling in his chest was overwhelming—he had given up entirely on trying to tamp down his emotions around Dean. It didn’t work even if he tried. He noticed Anna glancing between them out of the corner of his eye.

Anna’s eyes went wide and she stood up to place her hand on Cas’s forehead. “My dear brother, you look unwell!”

Cas stared at her—true, his muscles were stiff and his feelings were unsettled, but he felt perfectly well. What was Anna playing at? She continued, “Is it a megrim? I know how you suffer from them when you work too hard.” Cas narrowed his eyes at her. He had never suffered from headaches, and Anna knew that.

“So ill that you cannot even speak!” Anna declaimed, throwing herself into whatever dramatic role she had conjured up. She pulled him to sit at the table, and disappeared, reappearing with her cloak and hat so quickly that Cas suspected she had them stowed just outside the room. “I will go down to see Ellen and ask if she has any remedies. I might be detained for some time, though, for I promised Joanna the other day that I would show her the newest fashion plates.” And before Cas could object to her lack of chaperone, Anna had swept out the kitchen door and out into the evening.

Cas looked at Dean and saw the other man was holding in laughter. “What?”

Dean coughed. “Your sister just excused herself so that we could be alone.”

“She could have just said so.”

“Would you have let her?” Dean shook his head when Cas hesitated. “I also suspect that she enjoyed the complete bafflement her performance inspired in you.”

Cas had nothing to say in reply. The laughter had left Dean’s eyes and they were sharp again, intent, _predatory_.

“Cas,” Dean’s voice was low. “Stand up.”

He did, stumbling a little as he backed away from the table.

“Dean, I…” Cas bumped into a chair and put his hand on it to steady himself. “I should have told you.”

“Damn right you should have,” Dean growled as he closed the distance between them, backing Cas into the wall, pressing their bodies together. “And don’t get me wrong, I am irritated that you still thinking keeping secrets from me is a good idea. But right now I don’t care.” Dean’s mouth crashed down onto Cas’s, and Cas gasped at the feeling. Dean took advantage of that opening and thrust inside Cas’s mouth, stroking Cas’s tongue with his own, pulling moans out of Cas’s throat with the force of the kiss. Cas registered that his hands were clawing at Dean’s back, trying to pull him even closer. A fire burned in his blood hotter than he had ever felt. He felt Dean grab his hand and move it down to where their hips were pressed together, where Cas could already feel Dean growing hard.

“Touch me,” Dean rasped between kisses, as his mouth moved over to Cas’s neck. “Fuck, I need your hands on me.” He pulled down Cas’s cravat to bite Cas’s neck when Cas ran his hand over the hardening length, and Cas moaned at the feel of Dean’s teeth marking his skin. Cas fumbled with the buttons on Dean’s trousers, but stilled when Dean pulled away and shook his head. “Tonight, you’re going to tell me exactly what you want to do and what you want me to do before it can happen.”

Cas’s heart seized. He had learned that Dean liked it when Cas talked, but he had only managed it when they were both so desperate for each other that his inhibitions fell away. Dean knew this. Then he caught the look in Dean’s eyes and realized—Dean’s entire life was about to change irrevocably—he was scared. Maybe he needed Cas to be vulnerable and take a risk.

He took a deep breath and allowed himself one weak moment, saying, “I’ll say the wrong thing.”

Dean kissed the other corner of Cas’s mouth and then rested briefly with their cheeks pressed together to whisper, “As long as you don’t call my cock a noble staff or some other nonsensical phrase, you’ll do just fine.” Cas huffed out a strained laugh. “Oh God, you’re going to make me do this.”

“Yes,” Dean said as he pushed away from Cas to lock gazes with him. “And you’re going to do it here.”

The tone of Dean’s voice—fond, desperate, and more than a little exasperated—unlocked something. Cas had managed boldness in the clearing, on that disastrous drive to see Mr. Singer, and in Dean’s cottage, so surely he could manage it again. But he needed something, that wild yearning that Dean could stir up in him. He could work up to the biggest requests and start with something smaller.

“I want you to kiss me,” he managed, and when Dean raised his eyebrows, Cas rolled his eyes. “On the mouth, insufferable man.” Dean leaned forward and kissed Cas so gently that it was almost worse than not being kissed at all. He pulled away and snapped, “Harder.” Dean grinned before leaning back in, his lips firm, tongue teasing the edge of Cas’s bottom lip. This was better. Cas could feel the fire building back up and tangled his fingers in Dean’s hair, pulling the other man more firmly into the kiss. He smiled against Dean’s lips when a deep groan from Dean vibrated into the kiss.

When they were both gasping, he tore his mouth away and panted, “I want to touch you,” then added before Dean could say something insolent, “I want to unbutton your trousers and touch your cock.” His voice dropped on the last word and he felt his face heat, but his embarrassment melted away when Dean’s mouth kicked up on one side and his eyes went to Cas’s mouth. Cas bit his lip, and Dean’s eyes went hot. “Tell me what you want.” God, Cas hoped that wasn’t cheating, but he had to know what Dean was thinking.

“I’m thinking about how I love hearing your saintly mouth say filth. I want more of that.”

Was Dean issuing a challenge or an invitation? Was Dean getting pleasure from seeing Cas struggle to articulate what was much easier to do? Was he deriving pleasure from this game? The hardness in his own trousers seemed to confirm that. “Very well,” Cas said, voice stiff and formal for a moment until he shook himself and continued, “You want your saintly vicar to speak filth to you? Take your cock out.” Cas allowed himself a small smile when he felt Dean’s grip harden on his arms.

“Now, please.” Cas doubted that politeness was part of the filth Dean wanted, but Dean was unbuttoning his trousers and pushing down his smalls, and Cas took a moment to appreciate the sight of Dean, desperate and almost fully clothed but for hisjutting erection, trusting Cas to follow him. Cas pushed slowly on Dean’s shoulders, reversing their positions so that Dean was pressed against the wall, saying, “I’m going to frig you until you come in my hand.” Dean dropped his head back onto the wall, closing his eyes. “Forget what I said—not a word more, or this will be over before it starts.”

Cas felt something like—pride, that could be the only word, welling up inside him. That and sheer need for the man he had pinned to the wall with just his body and words. Cas spit into his palm and Dean’s eyes flew open, gazing in disbelief at Cas. “What?” Cas asked, “This will make it feel better.” Dean choked on his own words, trying to grind into Cas, but Cas leaned against him to still the movement. “I’m going to touch your cock now.” He reached down and wrapped a hand around Dean’s erection, the spit easing the glide of his hand over the hard, hot flesh. Cas felt he was beginning to understand how to talk filth to Dean. He just had to say what he was going to do and then what he was doing.

As his confidence grew, so did the pace of his hand—and his words. “You’re so hard for me,” he told Dean between kisses that were more passionate than skillful. “You make the sweetest sounds when I’m touching you.” Dean had one hand in Cas’s hair and the other hand on his arse, and Cas arched slightly into the touch, enjoying the feel of Dean’s fingers digging into the flesh and muscle. “But you make the best sounds when you come. I want you to say my name when you come, Dean.” He tightened his grip. Dean shuddered against him, then threw his head back and did as Cas had bid him, gasping “Cas,” before pulling Cas to him and burying his face in Cas’s hair. Cas pressed into Dean, too dazed with lust to feel embarrassment at what he had just said and done.

“Fuck, Cas,” Dean said after several moments had passed. “If that’s how you apologize for keeping secrets, please, get some new secrets.”

Cas laughed into Dean’s shoulder. “I truly am sorry, Dean. I try to forget that I’m rich. I tried to give that dreadfully large house to Anna, but she said she preferred hers. I don’t want it.”

Dean cupped Cas’s face in his hands. “I’m not angry with you, but no more secrets.” Cas sighed and rubbed his cheek over Dean’s palm.

“That’s hard for me,” Cas said, and then added as Dean arched a brow, “I’m not used to having people I can be honest with. I tried to be someone besides myself when I was a child to please my parents, I’ve been playing my role of vicar so that I had a place in the world—I’m still learning to be myself with you. And Anna too, I suppose. I think I need practice. Can you please be patient with me?”

“Of course,” Dean pulled him into a slow, deep kiss, a kiss that reminded Cas that he was still painfully aroused.

“You don’t have to be perfect,” Dean said, pulling Cas toward the bedroom, “I’d rather you weren’t. And you don’t have to change overnight. But no more secrets, and one more request for now.”

“What?” Cas followed Dean, feeling as if he were rushing into something unknown.

“Let me take care of you.”

Cas shivered a little, and followed Dean into the bedroom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I will try to keep the coming onslaught of Regency-era legal shenanigans as brief and entertaining as possible.


	21. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean realizes a few things.

Dean awoke slowly, realizing only by degrees that he was still at the vicarage, that Cas’s back was pressed against his chest, that the ache in the vicinity of his heart was something stronger than liking and more complicated than desire. He buried his nose in Cas’s hair and inhaled, the scent that had long disappeared from the cravat filling his senses. Plain soap, sunshine, and—home. The word rocked Dean’s world on its axis. He couldn’t pick apart the scent enough to understand its components, but he knew in his bones that it meant safety and love.

Dean was lost, utterly and completely in love with Cas. He’d known this, if he were honest, since the night in his cottage, but so much had been—was still—uncertain that he had needed to push it to the back of his mind. The coming weeks would be a misery as they worked to bring down Gresham, but maybe, just maybe, there would be space for them on the other side of this. Maybe Dean could talk Cas into walking away from his life’s worth to do…Dean didn’t know what, but something that would allow them to live together. Dean didn’t trust the little flame of hope, but he could not help but hold it close, as if it would keep him warm through the coming ordeal. Dean only realized he had tightened his arms around Cas when the other man shifted, mumbling something in his sleep. Relaxing his hold, Dean stayed still until Cas’s breathing evened out and deepened, then rose and dressed as silently as he could before making his way to the kitchen.

Anna was sitting at the table with a cup of tea, toasted bread, and an egg. She had not brought a maidservant with her, but each morning appeared as if the finest lady’s maid had helped her dress and style her hair. She gave Dean a sly smile over her teacup.

“I hope you slept well.”

Dean felt he should be embarrassed, but did not find any such emotion when he looked for it. He shrugged. “I did. And you?”

“Quite. Tea is in the pot, and bread for toasting by the fire.”

Dean toasted bread and poured some tea, unsure of how to proceed. He had not been alone with Anna before, and while he would usually ease the way with flirtation, he felt entirely unequal to the task. Anna, he suspected, did not need compliments and insinuations to be happy with herself, and he would rather save those for Cas.

Anna broke the silence once he was seated. “Are you ready?”

“No, but I don’t think I ever will be.”

She smiled at him. “Honesty—I like that. It’s too bad you won’t be taking society by storm. I think we would have had great fun cutting a swath through the ballrooms of Mayfair.”

Dean pretended to consider this for a moment. “I’m afraid I’m a simple man and would disappoint you greatly.”

“Yes, which is why you and my brother are so well-suited. Cas never could stand balls and social calls. He always saw through the hypocrisy of it all too clearly for everyone’s comfort. I see it too, but I enjoy it and don’t say uncomfortable truths in company. Well, very often.”

“He won’t be disappointed that I walk away from it all?” Dean could hardly believe he’d asked this woman such a bald-faced question, but he had to know.

Anna laughed. “Why ever would you think he would want you to stay?”

Dean considered for a moment. “He seemed so set on me becoming Gresham.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “You two are both idiots, you know. You’re obviously mad for each other, neither of you wants a conventional life, but you’re so afraid the other does that you never simply sit down and _talk_. Thank God I’m done with men’s nonsense.”

Dean frowned. “But he deserves better than any sort of life he would have with me.”

“Yes, and he believes the same about you. If you both focused less on what people deserve and more on what people want, you’d soon solve the problem. Life is much simpler when you dispense with ‘should’ and deal with what is actually there.”

Anna’s speech silenced him. _Should_ had dominated his life, guilt nagging him the entire time he had been away from Lawrence-in-the-Vale, knowing that the people there suffered with no check on Gresham’s behavior. The world _should_ be different, he _should_ be able to put a stop to Gresham’s exploitation, he _should_ save every worn-out horse from the knacker’s knife, he _should_ fix everything. Never mind that Ellen was perfectly capable of protecting the countryfolk from the worst of Gresham’s tendencies or that Cas was a grown man capable of making decisions for himself. When had he learned that he was the only person who could set things right in the world?

Anna considered him, then stood, motioning for Dean to remain seated when he tried to rise. “I should leave you to your thoughts. The day is bright and warm, so I will go wander some country lanes and bemoan the regrettable lack of smartly-dressed young bucks to admire.” She winked at him before removing her hat from where it hung beside the door and leaving the house.

Dean felt as if the pieces that made him up were being shuffled and reorganized into a new man. Was this what Cas had been feeling the previous night? It was strange—not entirely unpleasant, but uncomfortable at the least. He felt as if he would need to comb over every part of his life leading up to this moment, see every incident afresh, and decide which pieces to keep and which to throw on the rubbish heap. This would not be fast work, he knew, and felt a mix of dread and excitement at the prospect. Dean would have suspected Anna of witchcraft—for who but a witch could walk into this vicarage and size him up so quickly and say the exactly correct words at the correct moment?—but he feared he might be guilty of the idiocy she had accused him of.


	22. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time to go to London! Cas makes a joke. Dean wants to take a break from thinking about the future.

Dean was on Baby, trotting along next to the carriage, and Cas was trying not to stare out the window at him too much. But really, what was too much? Every other minute? Every few seconds? Anna had dozed off not ten miles out of the village, leaving Cas alone with his thoughts, and he wished he had a horse to ride alongside Dean and share fresh air and even the briefest snatches of conversation. They were as prepared as they ever would be—the Lord Chancellor would meet them on their third day in London, giving them time to get Dean outfitted as befit a lord and to make contact with their allies in the peerage.

Dean looked serious, his expression set, eyes gazing straight forward, not glancing over to the carriage to see Cas staring at him like a lovestruck swain. Dean had been unusually quiet and pensive during their last days in the village before departing. Cas could not fault him for it—Dean was under enormous pressure and would expose himself to Gresham by publicly claiming the title. But the distance still pricked at Cas’s heart, which had grown unforgivably tender and vulnerable of late. They would need to see this through, he told himself, and then they could figure out what would come next. If anything would come next.

Cas shook himself as if to jar loose the threads of melancholy that were starting to wind around him. It wasn’t much further to town, and then they would go to the house in Mayfair, where they might finally get a moment to themselves before plunging into the chaos. Anna was returning to her own house, declaring that she had rusticated enough at the vicarage. Cas had refused to bring on more staff at his own house, arguing that their stay would be brief enough that hiring more would be inconvenient, but secretly he thought that hiring staff who could be trusted to be discreet about the nature of his and Dean’s relationship would be too difficult, and he didn’t think he could last many more days keeping his distance. Those already in his employ could be trusted to cover up a murder, he was sure, so two men tupping each other would not give them pause.

The carriage began to pass through more populous areas, and Dean had to drop behind the carriage to leave room for the oncoming traffic. Cas rested his head on the plush squabs. Truly, Anna had purchased the most comfortable carriage he had ever ridden in. He closed his eyes and tried to doze even as anxiety made his stomach clench.

Anna had the carriage deposit him at the back of the Mayfair house, and Cas waited while Dean saw Baby stabled. They were keeping their arrival in London as quiet as possible until their meeting with the Lord Chancellor was over, so the knocker was not on the front door and Cas and Dean would use the servants’ entrance. Dean gave him a tight smile as they entered through the kitchens, servants handling the small trunks for them. Dean kept glancing back at the servant carrying his scant belongings, and Cas felt a pang when he realized that Dean probably felt guilty about having someone do work that he was fully capable of. Cas could sympathize to a degree—after all, he mostly did for himself at the vicarage—but he had grown up with servants drawing baths, cleaning his clothes, cooking for him, carrying anything heavier than a book, and so noticed more when he did work for himself than when others did it for him.

Cas led Dean to the room he’d had prepared for him—the Green Room, his mother had always called it, and green it remained. The sage shade of the walls had faded somewhat over the years, but the room still radiated calm. Cas had chosen it for Dean because thinking of that room reminded him of the day they talked by the pool in the woods. Dean looked around the room, running a hand through his hair.

Cas cleared his throat. “Would you like to order a bath? The roads were very dusty.”

Dean smiled as he turned to face Cas, the first genuine smile that Cas had seen in days. “I think I liked baths better when you had to run back and forth between the fire and the tub, but it would be nice to feel clean.” Something loosened in Cas’s chest. If Dean could tease him, then surely all would be well.

“I suppose I could do the water fetching—the staff already find me eccentric.”

“Oh no, Cas, I didn’t—“ Dean broke off and laughed. “You’re joking with me.”

“Yes.” Cas couldn’t help but preen a little. He’d made Dean laugh on _purpose_. He’d made people laugh in the past, but not always when he meant to. Dean stepped toward Cas and gathered him up in a hug.

“We’ll make it through,” Dean said into Cas’s hair. While it was a statement, Cas felt the question underneath Dean’s words. He tightened his arms.

“Yes,” he said, voice muffled by Dean’s shirt. Cas moved to press a kiss to the skin above Dean’s neckcloth before stepping a few inches back, just enough to look into Dean’s eyes. “Oh.”

“What?” Dean gave him a concerned look, but Cas shook his head and laughed.

“I had them prepare the Green Room for you and I thought it was because it reminded me of our time in the woods, but it’s because of your eyes.”

“Was that—Cas, are you being _romantic_?”

Cas felt his mouth was hanging open and that he should do something about that, look more dignified, but he just stayed where he was, gaping at Dean. “I—I suppose I am?”

“And here I thought you were putting me in some room far away from you so that no one would gossip.”

“Of course not! I just thought, I wanted, oh blast, I didn’t want to assume anything and thought you might like to have a space to yourself.” Cas spoke quickly, wanting to reassure Dean, but then caught the teasing glint still in the other man’s eyes. “And now I just realized that you’re _joking_ with me and I’ve gone and made a fool of myself.”

Dean drew him back into an embrace and laughed softly in Cas’s ear. “No, darling, no. I shouldn’t have made that joke. Of course you would think of my comfort first.”

Had Dean just called him darling? The endearment had slipped so easily from Dean’s lips, as if he’d been calling Cas “darling” for years. It did uncomfortable things to Cas’s heart. But right now he had to clear up a few things with Dean, so Cas pulled back—gently—once again.

“The staff made up the large bedroom for me, and you’re more than welcome to visit—or stay—or I could come here. Really, whatever you would like.” He felt the flush climb up his cheeks. "No one will gossip.”

Cas saw Dean’s smile start at one corner of his mouth and creep across to the other side—a slow, sensual promise.

“Oh, I will certainly visit, and I’ll even stay if the visit is pleasant enough.”

Cas wanted to lean in and kiss that smile, taste the happiness and heat that simmered just below the surface. He closed his eyes and groaned.

“But first, baths. And then food. And we really should practice what we’ll say at our meeting with the Lord…” he trailed off when Dean placed a single finger against his lips.

“Yes, yes. We’ll do all of that, but first—“ Dean replaced his finger with his lips in a lingering kiss, “we’re going to spend a quarter of an hour not thinking about anything at all.”

Cas sank into the kiss, letting his mind go blissfully blank.


	23. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The meeting with the Lord Chancellor goes poorly. Cas panics. Dean eats a bunch of berry tarts.

The Lord Chancellor, Dean was fairly certain, was a pompous ass. Bewigged and frowning, the man sat behind his large desk and looked for what had to be the hundredth time at the parish register Cas had handed over.

They had decided that Cas would do most of the talking since he had grown up in high society, and they had practiced every evening since arriving in town with Anna in the role of Lord Chancellor. She had taught Dean as much as she could about sitting like a lord (some mysterious combination of looking like he had a stick up his arse and like he found it all insufferably dull), speaking like a lord (drawling just the right words and fastidiously enunciating others). Dean noticed that Cas did none of these things, but when a person was born into that world they could break any number of rules, it seemed, and still be welcome. Only those who sought entry needed to monitor every word and gesture.

What had surprised Dean the most was how he enjoyed looking the part of a dashing young lord about town. Granted, the clothing was deuced tight, and he had to be constantly on guard against dirtying the fine fabrics, but after seeing Cas’s eyes flare with appreciation over how the well-fitted trousers stretched over his thighs, Dean had decided he would not mind keeping some of his new wardrobe. Cravats could go to the devil, though, unless Cas was wearing one.

The Lord Chancellor looked up from the register and addressed Cas, his eyes only briefly skating over Dean, as if he hadn’t yet decided if Dean was a man or a beast. “This is most irregular, Mr. Novack. A secret marriage? Legitimate issue unclaimed? An illegitimate son brought up as the heir? These accusations are grave indeed.”

Dean just restrained himself from gagging. He’d always thought _bastard_ or _whelp of a whore_ the worst he could be called, but being reduced to _legitimate issue_ made him long to scrub himself until his skin was raw.

Cas turned his grave gaze towards Dean before turning back to speak to the Chancellor. It felt like a lifeline, that brief moment when their eyes met.

“These are indeed grave charges to bring, especially against a man dead for several years. But I would not have brought these before you, my lord, if I did not believe they were true.”

The conversation was going in circles. Dean glanced at the clock. They had been here for three quarters of an hour, and the Lord Chancellor seemed to be stalling, unwilling to proclaim anything. The Lord Chancellor turned his frown toward Dean and stared at him as if he could see the truth of Dean’s birth written on his face. Dean kept still, though he longed to stand up and shake the man, blast him. The Lord Chancellor closed the register with a thump.

“This will need to go before the Committee on Privilege,” he declared. “Lord Gresham deserves a chance to prove his case, and since you have produced no witnesses to the marriage, I cannot rule in this matter. The Committee will investigate.”

“My lord,” Cas started, but stopped when Dean managed to catch his eye. Dean mouthed two words, hoping Cas would understand: _pork pie_. “Ah, thank you for your time, Lord Chancellor. We are eager to have the Committee bring the truth to light.” Cas stood and bowed, Dean scrambling up to bow just a moment behind. Dean followed as Cas stalked out of the Lord Chancellor’s chambers and made it into the carriage before he started shaking.

“Dean, dearest.” Cas quickly pulled the curtains across the windows before gathering Dean in his arms. “You were brilliant.” The viselike grip Cas had on him felt like the only thing holding Dean together. He’d thought he had enough armor to withstand the scorn of anyone. He had been wrong. Everything, apparently, had changed the moment he decided to claim the title and publicly challenge his brother.

“You looked and acted every inch the lord. You behaved with better grace than the Lord Chancellor.” Dean knew he shouldn’t care about any of that, but Cas’s words soothed him somewhat.

“He looked at me like I wasn’t even a person,” he gasped through his shaking.

“He’s an ass,” Cas said with startling vehemence, and Dean gave a strangled laugh at Cas echoing his thoughts. “You’re the best person I know.”

Dean laughed again, only a slight trace of bitterness in the sound. “You have to say that—I’m in your bed, after all.”

Cas pulled back and looked—angry? “Don’t you dare say that, Dean. Don’t you dare cheapen this. I know it takes time to change how you think of yourself, but damn it, I’m tired of hearing you speak ill of yourself, of the man I—“ he broke off, and his face went still.

Dean needed to hear how that sentence ended. A wild hope expanded in his chest, but he didn’t let it free. Everything Cas said and did suggested this hope was not unfounded, but Dean could not let it loose without confirmation. Perhaps years of it.

“We need to focus on the Committee,” Cas said, turning to face forward. Dean felt suddenly cold, though Cas kept an arm around him. “I’ll send a messenger after Mr. Singer, to request his presence here. Gresham will hear soon, if he hasn’t already, and will arrive in town. Anna will have ideas about strategy.”

Dean sat there, unable to reply. A gulf seemed to have opened up between them in that moment, and he didn’t know how to cross it. How could Cas move so quickly from concern to planning? Cas had unbent over the course of the autumn, smiled and even laughed more easily, but now that they were in town, Cas was stiffening up again, withdrawing more into himself. He would confront Cas—yell, even—if he thought it would do any good, but he feared that would only send Cas further away.

Cas disappeared to the study the moment they arrived back at the house, off to write more letters, no doubt. Dean went directly to the stables and saddled Baby. He was going to get answers.

Anna rose from her seat to greet Dean when he was shown into her sitting room. “No more visitors, please,” she said to the footman, who nodded and closed the door behind him. “I take it the meeting with the Lord Chancellor did not go particularly well,” she said, looking gravely into Dean’s eyes, for all the world like her brother in that moment. Dean shook his head. “Please, sit. I’ll ring for tea, or something rather stronger, perhaps? Oh, and tarts as well. Cas mentioned you enjoy sweets.” She looked at Dean through the entire speech and while he gave directions to the footman for what to bring. Dean shifted in his chair.

“Thank you, Anna. I confess I haven’t eaten yet today.”

“The Lord Chancellor will do that to a body. Odious man. He’s more concerned with propriety than any decent person ought to be, and his love of the social order borders on medieval. To what do I owe the pleasure of your company today, Dean?”

Dean paused, unsure of how to start. He had just realized that Anna was just as managing and bossy as Cas could be, but that she did it with grace and charm so a person barely noticed they were being swept along. He needed to take care to keep on his feet.

“The Lord Chancellor has said the matter needs to go before the Committee on Privilege. Cas is writing letters.”

“That’s Cas, I’m afraid. Focusing on the business at hand rather than the person.”

Upset as he was, Dean felt a flare of anger. “That’s not true. Entirely. He ended the meeting when I gave him the signal that I couldn't bear it another minute. He was concerned at first when we returned to the carriage, but then he, well, he turned. I watched him shut me out.” He flushed. God, what was he turning into? He was supposed to be a hardened, world-weary bastard.

Anna reached out and squeezed his hand, her eyes large with sympathy. “That’s the trouble with loving Cas, isn’t it? He’ll give you something marvelous, and then pull himself away just when you get a glimpse of how things could be.”

Dean felt the hot prickle of tears behind his eyes. He nodded, not trusting his voice even to deny that word. Love.

“I used to think, when we were younger, that Cas couldn’t feel things the way the rest of us do, that he was cold. But I think it’s quite the opposite—I think he feels things more than we do, or that he has less protection against his feelings, and so when they threaten to overwhelm him he closes off. That doesn’t make it easier for me when he pulls away, but it does help me understand and be patient.”

Dean nodded again. His observations, and Cas’s own words, confirmed what Anna was telling him. But it didn’t lessen the hurt.

“How do you manage?” He managed to say after a long pause. Anna seemed content to sit there in silence. Her reply was interrupted by the arrival of tea. The tray also contained a selection of berry tarts and a bottle of whiskey. Anna poured, added a splash of liquor to each of their cups, and gave him half of each tart. She gestured for him to eat, and Dean’s stomach growled. He attacked the tarts.

“I didn’t for years—manage, that is. I said some unkind things to him and flaunted my rebellions to try to show him that he was wrong. I’ve tried to make amends since then, to let him come to me instead of trying to force my way of living on him. But I don’t think he feels entirely safe with me yet. When I came to Lawrence-in-the-Vale, he was the happiest with me he’s ever been. And I think it was because of you.”

Dean choked on a mouthful of tart. Anna arched a brow at him.

“He feels safe with you, at least safer than he does with anyone else, it seems. He cares a great deal for you, Dean.”

Dean drained his teacup, welcoming the burn of the whiskey down his throat. “Can that be enough?” Why was he asking Anna this? She wasn’t an all-seeing deity, for all he was treating her like one.

Anna shook her head. “You’re the only person who can answer that, Dean. But as Cas’s sister, and, I hope, your friend, I hope you’ll decide it is. Cas is scared right now. It’s not fair to you. You’re the person putting your entire life at risk, but Cas might need to take his time, or you might need to take action.”

Dean was grateful that Anna turned the conversation to lighter subjects. He worked his way through the other half of the tarts while she shared the latest scandals and plots of the _ton_. Hyde Park tempted him off the route back to Cas’s house, and he found a stretch of wide, empty path where he could let Baby run like the wind. He had decisions to make about his future, and he needed the pounding of hooves and the surge of muscle to quiet his mind and remind him who he was.

By the time he arrived back at the house, Dean had resolved to spend the night alone in the Green Room. He couldn't decide if it was out of petty desire to make Cas feel what it was like when the man he loved withdrew, or if it was to protect his bruised heart.


	24. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cas drinks. The grand gesture is imminent!

Dean hadn’t come to Cas’s room the previous night and had left the house at first light, returning at dusk only to shut himself up in the Green Room. Cas had spent the night tossing and turning in his too-big bed, replaying the disastrous meeting with the Lord Chancellor and the even worse carriage ride back to the house. Dean was suffering, hurt, and angry with him, but Cas was barely holding himself together back in the city he hated for its noise and bustle. He had been on the verge of ending the meeting when Dean had given the signal—the Lord Chancellor was obsessed with people behaving in the ways he wanted them to, and it had set something off in Cas he had long thought gone. That urge to deny everything about who he was, to destroy himself to please another had welled up until he was near choking on it.

Then in the carriage, with Dean hanging on every word, he had pulled back like the coward he was. Dean deserved better than he could give. Maybe it was for the best that Dean was angry and staying away from Cas. Better this ended now than later, when love would be rooted so deeply in Cas’s heart that ripping it out would destroy the organ. Cas had dwelled on these thoughts through the long, lonely night until rising from his bed. He hadn’t bothered shaving or dressing carefully. He would haunt the halls of the house until Dean returned safely and then keep vigil while Dean slept.

He also expected the messenger he had sent to Mr. Singer back at any moment. Changing horses at every posting inn, a rider could travel to and from Mr. Singer’s residence in a single day, and Cas hoped the delay meant that the hastily-written letter had persuaded Mr. Singer to join the messenger on his return to London. Dean was now in the Green Room, the dinner Cas had sent up eaten, the empty dishes left in the hall for a servant to collect. Now he only waited for word from Mr. Singer.

An urgent knock at the study door had him racing to open it, forgetting for a moment that he could simply tell the person to enter. The butler stood there with the messenger, who looked travel-worn and dusty. Mr. Singer was nowhere in sight. Cas’s heart fell.

“Please, enter. You look tired—would you like tea or supper?”

The man shook his head. “I apologize, Mr. Novack, for returning without Mr. Singer.”

“Did he at least send a reply?”

The man shifted from one foot to the other and looked to the side. “Not in writing, sir.”

Cas felt ready to shake the man. He needed to know what Mr. Singer had said—he had no time for qualms or delicacy. He kept his voice pleasant and polite as best he could. “Do not fear offending me. I know Mr. Singer is a rough man. Tell me what he said.”

“He,” the man looked up at Cas before averting his gaze again and examining the carpet, “Well, sir, he said to tell you that he would come to London the day the Prince Regent showed his bare arse by the Serpentine and not a day sooner.”

“Ah, I see. Thank you.” He paid the man and had the butler escort him to the kitchen for supper before closing the door, leaning back against it, and sliding to the ground. They were, as he suspected Dean would say, well and truly fucked. The reminder that Dean was up in the Green Room hating him had Cas doubling over with pain until his face was almost on the floor. Everything was falling apart. If only he could get the pain in his heart to stop, perhaps he could think. But the usual herbal remedies wouldn’t touch it, he knew. A sudden thought had Cas up and moving out of the house, past the butler sputtering protestations that surely Cas could not leave without at least a coat.

There was one place a heartbroken man could go to dull his pain for at least a time.

Several hours—time had gone all fuzzy around the edges after the third pint, so he couldn’t be sure—later, Cas stumbled back up the steps to the house, almost falling into the entryway when the butler (now wide-eyed and concerned) opened the door to his persistent knocks. When the older man seemed assured that Cas would not cast up his accounts on the carpets, the butler disappeared up the stairs, leaving Cas alone to contemplate how strange the house looked when one had drunk far more than was good for a body. Everything was tilting this way and that, and he tried to hold very still, but with the floors all askew and the staircase wobbling back and forth, it was a difficult task.

“Hhhhom—hoooome—hommmmm.” He laughed a little as he tried out the word with his uncooperative lips and tongue, laughing a little at how utterly _bad_ he was at everything. He had been right to think that ale would dull the pain of heartbreak, but it seemed to have opened up secret storerooms of self-loathing that he hadn’t known existed. God, he was worthless—heartbroken and couldn’t even hold his liquor.

A wobbly man came down the wobbly stairs. Dean. Cas tried to stand up straighter, but feared he had not achieved the desired effect when Dean practically dove off of the stairs to prop him up.

“What the hell, Cas? What happened?”

“I found a—“ Cas broke off to think, squinting at Dean’s face. “A _publican house_!” He waved a finger in the air, proud of recalling the word for the lovely warm place that kept ale coming as long as you had coin. “And I drank it.”

“Good God. How much did you drink?”

“All of it.” He flung his arms out to the sides, and Dean caught him just before he could topple over.

Dean rolled his eyes. “You’d be dead if you did that, Cas. But you’re foxed, that’s for certain. Come on. Let’s get you bed.”

“No point. Want to drink more.” Cas turned and grasped Dean’s shoulders. He had something, there was something important he had to tell Dean. Something beside his desperate need for more ale. “Mr. Bobby, he’s not coming. ’S all over. Done. Ended. Over. Did I say that al—“

Dean cut him off. “What the hell, Cas? Why didn’t you tell me right away instead of going to a pub and doing your best to drown yourself in a barrel?”

Cas shrugged. “Nothing more to do. ’S all ruined.”

“God damn it, Cas, there has to be something else we can do! You’re supposed to have the plan, ideas. I’ve just been trusting you, doing what you planned, and now you’ve gone and given up after asking me to do all of this?”

“So sorry, Dean,” Cas slurred, the ‘e’ in Dean stretching out until he got control back of his mouth. Perhaps he had drunk a little too much? No, this was better than being sober.

Dean sighed, and even in his state, Cas heard the resignation and exasperation in that single sound. “Bed. Now. There’s no point in fighting about it with you in this state.” He started to guide Cas up the stairs, waiting patiently when Cas had to take a moment to judge the height of a step. God, climbing stairs was harder than Cas remembered.

Cas let Dean undress him, his limbs flopping like a rag doll. He drank the water that Dean forced on him and then repeated, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry” until Dean shook his head, muttered something about how Cas would do penance with a headache in the morning, and left. Cas fell asleep quickly, but spent the night in restless, frightening dreams of Dean dead at Gresham’s hand while he stood by, unable to move or speak.

When light filtered through the gaps in the curtains, Cas cracked an eye open, and immediately shut it against the glare, cursing. A spike of pain pierced his head, and his stomach felt as if it would reject anything he swallowed. After a few moments, he turned away from the windows and opened his eyes again, which didn’t make anything worse, even if it didn’t make anything better. A note on the table next to the bed, propped against a teacup, caught his attention. He read it slowly, his brain taking long moments to turn the bold slashes of Dean’s handwriting into words.

_Drink this. It will help your head. There’s dry toast downstairs. Eat it. It will help your stomach._

Cas sniffed the contents of the teacup suspiciously. Willowbark tea. He drank it and sank back into the mattress. After long minutes, Cas felt the headache ease somewhat. Enough that he could rise from the bed and dress. Shaving would wait another day. Cas had spent the time waiting for the tea to work formulating a plan. Dean was right—he had given up too easily. He made it down the stairs to the breakfast room without throwing up, which had to be a good sign, and as he munched on toast, Cas asked a footman for pen and paper. He addressed a note to Dean and then ordered a horse saddled. He would need to stop by the side of the road to let his breakfast come back up at some point, but there was no time to waste. He had a long ride ahead.


	25. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean reads Cas's letter and has some feelings about the contents (it's ROMANTICAL). Lucifer arrives in London.

When Dean cracked open the door to the breakfast room, he half-expected to see Cas moaning about his head over tea and toast, but the room was empty. He scolded himself for feeling disappointed. Better for Cas to sleep. But then a folded paper with his name on it caught Dean’s eye, and he moved into the room. A footman appeared through a door to offer tea, but Dean waved him off with an apology, and opened the note.

 _Dean_ , the note began, and the writing was shakier than Cas’s usual steady, elegant hand. A sudden fear seized Dean when he saw the script and how Cas had filled the page, and he shoved the letter into his pocket. He strode out of the room, found his coat and hat, and walked the two miles to Hyde Park, where he found a secluded grove and sat with his back against a tree. If Cas was about to break his heart, he needed to be alone. The note was somewhat crumpled from his pocket, so Dean smoothed it out before beginning again, barely breathing.

> _Dean,_
> 
> _I must begin by apologizing for my behavior last night. It was unconscionable, and I deserved every word you said to me. I have failed you again, and it breaks me to know that. I say this not so that you will pity me or feel obliged to forgive me—I say this because you should know that you deserve more and better than either I or the world have ever given you. You are extraordinary. Your bravery in returning to a village that held memories of fear and pain and sorrow, your determination to protect those around you, and your insistence on remaining true to your principles humble me and those who see you for who you truly are. Even your love of your horse humbles me. You insist on caring even when the world has taught you that to love and care means to suffer._

> _Please, I beg you, know that no mater what happens in the coming days, that I will always hold you in the highest regard, and I will not fault you if you cannot hold me in any regard whatsoever. I did not set out to write this, but I feel I must, for fear that I will never have another chance. This is the truth—if my heart beats, it beats for you. If my lungs draw air, they breathe for you. If my eyes see, they do so because they hope to see you. My hand is shaking as I write this—it is half from the fear this confession provokes, half because I long to touch you, to trace the lines of your face, to feel the wild, warm life that animates you._

> _I have lived my life at a remove, keeping myself safe from the pain of loving anything—anyone. But when I am with you, my defenses fall. If you would let me, I would fall at your feet. There is a line I never understood in the marriage ceremony, “With my body, I thee worship.” I understand it now, for if you would let me, I would worship you with my body, my soul, so that you would know how precious and wondrous you are every day for the rest of your life._
> 
> _Forgive me if I have said too much or if my confession is unwelcome. You may burn this if you would rather forget it. I sat down to write a simple note explaining my whereabouts, but I cannot regret telling you the truth of my feelings. I will return soon. I have ridden out to find Mr. Singer and compel him to come to London, even if I must knock him over the head and tie him to my horse. I will not fail you again, and I will see you free of Gresham and the title, even if it means I never see you after this awful business is concluded. No matter what you decide, I will always remain,_
> 
> _Yours,_
> 
> _Cas_

Dean had to press a hand against his eyes to try to hold in the tears threatening to overflow. Burn the letter? He would keep it always, just as he would keep Cas, though the infuriating man still had some groveling to do. When he had composed himself, Dean wiped his eyes, brushed himself off, and returned to the path.

A tall man on a horse was riding in Dean’s direction. The shock of recognition stopped Dean in his tracks— _Sammy_. The name rocketed through his brain before he could correct it to Gresham or Lucifer. God, Dean had called him that before Gresham had turned the boy again him. He had shown Sammy how to catch frogs and handle them gently before returning them to the pond, how to skip stones across the water, how to be a little boy and not a little lord. But the man before him was nothing like Sammy. This man was smirking and cold and dressed so well that Beau Brummell himself would approve. Bile rose in Dean’s throat.

“Ah, brother,” Lucifer said, towering over Dean as he brought his horse closer. “I was hoping to see you before any meetings the Committee or Lord Chancellor might call. We have so much to discuss.”

“Do we?” Dean’s voice sounded rough in his own ears. Hopefully Lucifer would think it was from anger and not some softer emotion.

Gresham laughed, light and insincere. “We do. You’ve been hard to pin down, brother. Whenever I try to see you, you slip out of my grasp.”

Dean braced himself. There were a few other gentlemen out riding this early, but no one was close enough to intervene if Lucifer decided to murder him. Gresham shook his head as if Dean’s wariness pained him.

“I will do you no harm…here,” he said. “But I will destroy you and that pathetic vicar before the Committee and the Lord Chancellor. And the vicar’s sister as well—she still moves about in society. I will ruin you all socially and financially. Yes, brother, I know about your small fortune from horse trading.”

Dean wished he could pull Lucifer off his horse and give the man the beating he deserved. But he was still officially a bastard and Lucifer a lord, and he would hang for it, surely. He swallowed, hard, and forced his voice to be calm and polite when he replied, “We shall see what the Committee on Privilege decides, my lord.” He gave a shallow bow and turned to walk away. Lucifer’s laugh seemed to follow Dean as he hurried from the park to find Anna. They needed to strategize.


	26. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bobby gets dragged to London. Anna has succeeded a little too well in her plot to distract Lucifer. Cas and Dean have a slumber party.

It was raining, and Cas was soaked through by the time he reached Mr. Singer’s house. The long, solitary ride had cleared his head, even if his stomach still refused food. He’d made some decisions—if Dean would have him, or even if he wouldn’t, Cas would no longer be a vicar. The thought terrified him, but he also felt freer and lighter for having made the decision.

A plan had been forming in the back of his mind since that first visit to Mr. Singer when Dean had thrown out that accusation— _you’re trying to convince yourself that being a vicar is your calling, but you know it isn’t_ —and it was time to put it into action. Lawrence-in-the-Vale was only a few miles out of his way on the road from London to Suffalls, so he had stopped at the vicarage to gather his insect journals and a small specimen box, along with a second horse for Mr. Singer. He’d stopped by the tavern as well to consult with Mrs. Harvelle about Mr. Singer. She’d sent him off with two of her pork pies and a personal, bodily threat that she ordered Cas to deliver to Mr. Singer verbatim. The conversation had required disclosing the truth of Dean’s status, and she had taken it in stride, saying only, “I always suspected something was afoot with the old viscount, that scoundrel.”

Smoke was coming from Mr. Singer’s chimney, and Cas stabled the horses in the ramshackle outbuilding before pushing through the cottage’s front door without knocking. Mr. Singer, who had been sleeping near the fire in a chair, startled awake and reached for a gun next to his chair. Cas strode over and wrenched the weapon from the older man’s grasp.

“Mr. Singer, you are coming with me to London.”

***

It had taken nearly an hour to get Bobby sober and dressed for travel. Cas had resorted to repeating Mrs. Harvelle’s words, and the man had quieted and fallen into line with surprising speed after Cas had gotten to the part about “I will come to your miserable excuse for a cottage and destroy every bottle of liquor and speak to every person who might be persuaded to sell to you—you’ll never drink again.” The one concession Cas had made was addressing Mr. Singer using his Christian name. The man had a strong distaste for formality, which equalled his dislike for hygiene, company, and basic manners.

They were approaching the outskirts of London as dusk fell. Bobby had complained of the weather, the distance, the mount—Cas could understand now why Mrs. Harvelle had been so specific and vehement in composing her threat. The sky was long dark by the time they arrived in Mayfair, and Cas was surprised to see lights blazing from the house’s windows. He soon discovered the cause when Anna greeted him at the servants’ entrance. She sized Bobby up with a single glance and sat them down at the kitchen table with bowls of hot soup and crusty, fresh bread.

“I’ll go fetch Dean,” she said, “I’ve only just arrived myself. It has been an eventful day, brother.”

Cas only had moments to collect himself before Dean appeared, looking weary but well. Cas had wondered more than once that day if he had taken leave of his senses, committing that passionate declaration of love to paper, but he could not regret it. _The truth will set you free_ —another set of words he had not fully understood until today. He was still learning the full truth about himself, but even the small steps he had taken in writing to Dean and planting the seeds for the future had made him nearly giddy with relief. But Dean’s arrival in the kitchen still caused a spasm of anxiety.

Dean sat next to Cas, but beyond an impersonal, polite greeting, he gave Cas no indication of his feelings. Cas reminded himself sternly that it had only been one day since he had behaved so abominably. He had told Dean in his note that he would respect whatever Dean decided, and that loving someone did not obligate them to love, or even tolerate, you as well. These reminders gave scant comfort.

“Bobby,” Dean nodded once in the older man’s direction. Bobby nodded back.

“I’m glad you are back, brother,” Anna broke in when the silence began to stretch out uncomfortably. “Dean had a most interesting meeting with Gresham in Hyde Park this morning.” Dean gave a brief narration of his conversation with Gresham, and Cas grew even more unsettled. Gresham running around London making threats was not good news.

“I hope,” Cas said after clearing his throat, “That his threats may prove futile now that Bobby has joined our cause. Eyewitness testimony to the marriage should settle the case.”

“I expect Gresham will attack the character of the witness,” Anna added, nodding in Bobby’s direction. He had left his cottage looking less than gentlemanly, and a day on the road had done little to improve his appearance. “Dean informed me this morning of your journey, and we decided it best if I launched an early attack, as it were.” She gestured at herself, and Cas noticed for the first time that Anna was dressed to be out in company, her dress a deep blue and her hair done carefully in ringlets.

“Do I want to know?”

Anna smiled. “Perhaps not the details, but let us say that I have made myself very agreeable to Gresham without him learning my true name.”

Cas covered his face with his hands. “Even that is too much for me, I think.” The bench he sat on shook slightly, and Cas looked over to see Dean suppressing laughter. “And you approved of his?” Cas sharpened his voice, which only amused Dean even more.

“It was not my place to approve or disapprove. Anna is a grown woman and knows her own mind and the workings of society. She decided that a charming distraction would be most useful.”

“And what do you hope will be the result?” Cas turned back to Anna, seeing that Dean would be no help.

Anna shrugged. “I was able to learn Gresham's plans after expressing my shock that a lowborn villain was attempting to steal his fortune and title. He is relying almost entirely on his appearance and upbringing to carry the day. He has no proof that Dean’s mother’s marriage was dissolved or contracted illegally. He tried to get information about Cas and me, and it was clear he has nothing that would damage us.”

Cas relaxed some as he heard this. Anna’s ploy, it seemed, had been effective. She frowned a little before continuing, “I do fear, though, that I may have played my part too well. He offered to make me his mistress.” Cas choked on a spoonful of soup, and Dean pounded on his back. Bobby looked around a trifle desperately, as if a bottle of liquor might magically appear.

“What did you tell him?” Dean, at least, was remaining calm.

“I informed that I am not _that_ sort of widow, although, truthfully, I fear I might be.” Anna ignored Cas’s sputtering. “I might have been tempted if I didn’t know about his abominable treatment of his tenants and our Dean.”

Cas sputtered some more. Anna cut a smile in Dean’s direction. His sister enjoyed discomfiting him too much.

“Don’t get any ideas of playing Beauty to Lucifer’s Beast, Anna,” Dean said. “He’s not a good man.”

Anna turned serious. “Of course not. I know where my loyalties lie.”

The rest of their late supper passed quietly, with Anna drawing Bobby out into reluctant conversation. He looked concerned about Anna's plans to transform him into a respectably retired gamekeeper for the Committee on Privilege, but Cas could see he would not resist too much. The older man seemed afraid of Cas, which he felt a small and guilty amount of delight in. He had left instructions to have a room made up, and once he had seen Bobby settled comfortably, or as comfortably as the man could be without ready access to liquor, Cas made his way up to his bedroom to bathe and dress for bed. Another lonely night held no appeal, but he was bone-tired.

The fire was banked, the candle blown out, and Cas was staring up into the darkness when a soft knock on the door sounded. Cas sat up, anxiety and hope warring for dominance in his chest, the door shushed open, and he saw Dean’s silhouette.

“May I?” Dean said softly.

“Of course. Dean, you must know how sorry I am—“ his words were cut off by Dean’s kiss. It was as chaste as a kiss could be when exchanged in the dark of a bedroom one of them had just snuck into, a brushing of lips, nothing more. But it felt like a promise.

“I’m still unhappy about the past few days,” Dean spoke the words softly, his breath ghosting over Cas’s skin, “But I need you, Cas. And that letter—“

“I meant every word.”

“It was a very good letter. I’ll make you say everything in it out loud some time.”

“I will.”

“Please, can you hold me tonight?”

“Yes,” Cas breathed. He needed this too, the simple pleasure of touch, the exchange that came with giving comfort and receiving it in turn. Cas tugged Dean down onto the mattress and tucked Dean’s back against his chest. Their fingers twined together over Dean’s heart, and the rhythmic beat under his palm lulled Cas into sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are nearing the end!


	27. Dean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Committee on Privilege is meeting. Dean and Bobby go fishing to pass some time. Dean realizes a few things.

Dean hated waiting, but the Committee on Privilege apparently did not. His knee bounced as he sat in the stiff-backed chair, a stark contrast to Cas’s still, calm presence beside him. Bobby looked rather gray, but whether that was because he was nervous or suffering from a lack of alcohol was anyone’s guess. They had all worked to make Bobby as presentable as possible, and while he he would never cut a swath on Bond Street, he looked like a gamekeeper who had retired to live a respectable life, not a man broken by the death of his wife and too much drink.

They all rose to their feet—Cas smoothly, Dean only a little less graceful, and Bobby a full five seconds behind—when the door to the Committee’s chambers opened. Cas led the way in and Dean brought up the rear, only in part because he wanted to make sure Bobby didn’t make a run for it. The frowning group of men that greeted them only made Dean’s unease worse. He didn’t belong here, didn’t _want_ to belong here, but he had to play the role. _You survived a bear trap, you survived for years on your own, you’re not alone in this_. Taking a deep breath, Dean bowed to the assembled lords, a bow given to equals, and prepared to make his case.

***

The meeting with the Committee on Privilege had passed in a blur, though Cas said it had gone as well as could be expected. Cas had left the house after a luncheon none of them ate, saying only that he had business to attend to and that he would be back. Cas had also suggested that Dean take Bobby to Clapham Common to try the fishing there, producing tackle and bait so readily that Dean suspected he had been planning this outing since bringing Bobby to London.

If Cas meant for Dean and Bobby to mend their differences, he could wait until judgement day, but being outside in the late-fall sunshine instead of caged in a fine house appealed to Dean, so he asked the cook in the kitchen to pack a basket of food, and they set out to find the ponds.

Bobby relaxed by degrees as they reached the outskirts of the city and settled on a likely-looking spot to try their luck. The older man was taciturn and gruff, but as they settled in to wait for fish to bite, Dean remembered how Bobby had pulled him out of the lake after he had slipped on the muddy banks one spring. He had cared, in his own surly way, about Dean then. He had also failed Dean, and Dean did not know if he could ever entirely forgive Bobby for it, but he could sit here in the late-autumn sunshine, fishing line in the water, and feel something close to contentment.

“You grew up good, boy.” Bobby’s rasping voice broke the silence. Dean tamped down the retort that sprang to mind— _no thanks to you_ —and grunted instead. “You truly did. And maybe you wish I’d told what I knew earlier, but I can’t be sorry for keeping my counsel. He’d have destroyed you just like he destroyed Sam.”

“No, I don’t wish you’d told,” Dean spoke past the lump of anger and sorrow in his throat, “I don’t want the damned title. I’m going to do my best to see it ended, but I wish—why didn’t you do anything to help me? My mother?” He swallowed hard.

Bobby sighed and took a nip from a flask he had somehow procured since arriving in town. “I was afraid. I’m not proud of that. I’ve faced down angry game without a thought, but Gresham, he was different. Cunning, I guess you’d say, in the way a fox is cunning, but deadlier. Question him and he would destroy you, and after he threatened my wife, I kept my mouth shut and got out as quick as I could. She would have been ashamed of me, if I’d told her.”

Dean could dimly remember a kind woman who would send him home with food and a smile when he had been up at the manor house. “She was a good woman,” he offered, unsure of what to say.

“She couldn’t have been more ashamed than I was of myself,” Bobby pressed on, seeming not to hear Dean, “I’ve called myself a coward every day for leaving, even though I know I would do it the same way again. I loved her that much.” Dean glanced over when he heard the other man’s voice crack, but he looked back toward the pond when he saw Bobby straining to maintain his composure. A few silent minutes passed. “I don’t expect your forgiveness, or even your understanding, but I thank you for letting me say my piece.” Dean shifted his pole into one hand so that he could reach out and briefly clasp Bobby’s shoulder. He felt Bobby take a deep breath and released his grip. They continued to fish in silence.

Dean turned Bobby’s words over in his mind. That Bobby had loved his wife was clear, but Dean didn’t think he wanted that kind of love, the kind that made a person weak and frightened when someone challenged it. No, he wanted something that would make him brave, that would shore him up when an impossible decision faced him. He wanted a love that would walk beside him into the dragon’s lair and guard his back. He wanted Cas. He was imperfect, truly baffling at times, but Cas was trying and learning and doing better, just as he was learning and trying in return. Cas had walked back into a life he didn’t want and faced some of the most powerful men in the nation so that Dean would not be alone. Cas had listened to Dean and supported his plan to end the title and do right by the tenants and villagers, and he had not made demands or asked for promises in return. God, had he truly almost thrown it all away because Cas had trouble expressing his feelings sometimes? How stupid.

A sudden urgency raced through his body, and Dean glanced up at the sky. Only a few hours had passed, but it felt like a year since he had seen Cas, and he needed to see him. Now. “Don’t think we’re going to have any luck today, Bobby,” he said. “Let’s head back to the house.” _And then find Cas. And then…_


	28. Cas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Um...a lot happens really quickly in this chapter, and I have no idea why. I guess I couldn't keep the poor dears apart any longer?

Cas looked up at the house, weary, but satisfied. He still had much to do—the meeting with the Entomological Society of London had gone well, and his solicitor had proved helpful when it came to the finer points of searching for a well-appointed cottage in the country, but he still had to talk to Dean. They had reached an accord over the past few days, passing their time in companionable quiet when they weren’t readying for the meeting with the Committee, and sleeping through the nights in each other’s arms, but Cas knew it wasn’t enough.

He sent the butler to bed after learning that Dean was in the library and Bobby already gone to his room. The door shushed over the rug, barely making a sound, but Dean looked up from his book, the candlelight casting half of his face into shadow.

“Dean—“ Cas began as he walked forward, but he was cut off as Dean, having risen fast and silent from his seat, met him and pushed him back against a bookcase. The wood of the shelves dug into Cas’s back, but with Dean warm and hard against him, he would not complain.

“I’ve been waiting all evening for you,” Dean practically growled, his voice was so low, “And it’s time for you to say what you wrote. Tell me.”

“Dean,” Cas said as he tried to lift his hands to touch Dean’s face, but Dean had trapped his arms at his sides. “I, you are, oh God, I don’t even know how to start.”

Dean leaned in, his lips brushing the shell of Cas’s ear, making him shiver. “You could start with how magnificent you find me.”

Cas heard the smile in Dean’s voice, but he also heard that hard undercurrent of need. “You’re glorious. You are fierce and passionate, you put the world to shame.” He had to break off because Dean was undoing his cravat and pressing open-mouthed kisses to the bare skin of his throat. When he fell silent, Dean raised his head and ordered, “Keep going. Tell me what you want.”

Cas was certain he would start babbling any second, anything to keep Dean here, pressed against him, but he forced his thoughts into order. “I want to love you each and every day until we die, I want to fall asleep and wake up with you beside me. I would stand up in St. Paul’s and marry you if it were allowed. Please, Dean, _please let me love you_.” Cas held his breath as Dean lifted his head, meeting Cas’s eyes. His face was serious, solemn even.

“Will you love me, comfort me, honor, and keep me in sickness and in health; and, forsaking all others, keep only to me, so long as we both live?”

Cas sucked in a breath. Dean was reciting the marriage vows from _The Book of Common Prayer_. Granted, he was making some changes, but— “Good God, is this a wedding?”

Dean had the gall to smirk. “You’re not the only one who can go on mysterious errands. I have been doing some plotting of my own.”

“But there’s so much we have to discuss yet, we haven’t even—“

Dean silenced Cas with a swift kiss. “You already said you wanted to, and I won’t let you go back on your word. Besides, if we can work out how to bring down a lord, we can solve anything.” He paused, searching Cas’s face. “If you truly don’t want to, I won’t make you. But I want this, Cas. Your love makes me braver, and I want that. I want _you_.”

“Then yes, Dean. Yes. I promise all of those things.” Dean had released Cas’s arms at some point during the conversation, and he reached up, cradling Dean’s jaw before joining their lips in a kiss. Dean reached up to take Cas’s left hand, and he felt the press of a circle of metal on his ring finger.

“With this ring I thee wed, with my body I thee worship, and with all my worldly goods I thee endow.” Cas choked back tears at the sure, deep way Dean spoke.

“Now,” Dean said, smiling, “It’s your turn.” Cas blinked at the ring Dean held out to him.

“You were busy today,” he said.

Dean laughed. “The fish weren’t biting, so I decided to try my luck at catching a husband instead.” Cas pulled Dean down and into a kiss, only breaking off when Dean teased him for trying to sully his virtue before they were properly wed.

“With this ring I thee wed, with my body I thee worship, and with all my worldly goods I thee endow,” he managed to get out as the ring slid smoothly onto Dean’s finger. They clasped hands, both looking at the simple silver bands that now marked them as each other’s.

“Will you move to the country with me?” Cas broke the silence and Dean started. “Not Lawrence-in-the-Vale, of course. But I thought we could purchase a cottage. We could build stables.”

“And what would you do?” Dean smiled, and Cas’s heart did a strange little flip. Surely Dean would not laugh at his plans.

“I’ve resigned my position in the church—I sent my resignation the day we arrived in town, to be honest. You were right that I’m not a vicar, but I think I might be an entomologist. I visited the Entomological Society of London today, and they found my journals interesting. They think I might interest a publisher in a work on the lives of insects in England.” Cas avoided Dean’s gaze as he spoke, afraid for a moment that it would sound foolish to a practical man like Dean. But Dean tipped his chin up with two fingers, and Cas saw pride in Dean’s eyes.

“That’s brilliant, Cas. You’re brilliant.”

Cas flushed. “They were only excited because it was novel, the idea of studying insects when they are alive rather than dead.”

“Perhaps—if you travelled I could go with to see what I might discover?”

Dean shook his head. “I’ll get you to have proper pride some day. And yes, of course I want to go live in the country with you. I can train horses while you spy on insects.”

Dean grinned. “I would hope you would come with me! Although bathing on the road is tricky business, and I know how you love your baths.”

Cas had to laugh to let the joy welling inside him out. “It seems we have an excellent plan.”

“We do. No matter what happens with the blasted Committee, we will make a life worth living.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Entomological Society of London was a precursor to the Royal Entomological Society. A lot of entomologists at the time were interested in insects from countries that the English were colonizing, but Cas would definitely not be interested in participating in colonial projects.


	29. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's the end!!! Cas gives Dean a present. Dean takes a bath. Smooching ensues.

Dean was in heaven.

The sun dipped down towards the horizon as quiet settled over the countryside. The air had been alive with the sound of saws and hammering throughout the day as the stables took shape under his supervision. Cas had returned from London earlier in the day—his publisher had wanted to meet about the first volume of _The Life Cycles of British Insects_ to go over the pages before it went to press. Dean had longed to leave his work, but Cas had smiled and said, “Later” before going into the house for a bath and to rest.

The past few months had passed in a blur. After the Committee had ruled that Dean was the true Viscount Gresham, there had been much to do. Sam—Dean could think of him with that name again—had raged and ranted, but without the power of the title and the fortune that came with it, there had been little else he could do. His discovery of Anna’s identity had not gone well, and they had offered their cottage to Anna as a refuge, but she had merely tossed her head and said, “If you think I can’t handle one deposed false lord, you know me not at all.” It made him and Cas uneasy to know that she stayed in London while Sam was rumored to still be in town, but her regular correspondence eased their worry somewhat.

Dean had taken great pleasure in dismantling the Pecklow Manor estate. Selling off every piece of land he could, Dean had established funds for the tenants of the land, pensions for the servants, and funds for the village. Bobby had chosen to return now that there was no longer a lord of the manor, and he and Ellen had been scheming about village improvements. The former gamekeeper would never fully recover from the blows Gresham had subjected him to, but he was building a new life.

Despite being free with his money, Dean had enough left over to not worry too much about the success of the stables he was building. Cas had also sold off most of his holdings, the servants at the town house either receiving pensions, funds for apprenticeships, or positions in the cottage they had purchased in the country. It was far enough from London and Lawrence-in-the-Vale that no one knew them, but near enough to visit when they had want or need to. Their nearest neighbors only knew them as the unassuming Mr. Winchester and Mr. Novack, and if anyone thought it odd for two men of marriageable age to be living together, they did not remark on it.

Dean removed his dusty boots just inside the door and padded silently across the floors to find Cas. He was in his study, making notes in one of his notebooks, but he turned and smiled when he caught sight of Dean leaning against the frame.

“Already at work again?”

Cas stood and strode over to Dean, wrapping him in a strong embrace. “Just passing the time until you were done for the day. I missed you.” Cas pulled back, his smile growing mischievous. “I have a surprise.”

“Oh?” Dean desperately hoped the surprise involved nudity. Acres of it. When Cas produced a cravat— _the_ cravat—his hopes rose.

“Tie this over your eyes.” Dean complied, nearly vibrating with anticipation. Confusion followed when he felt Cas press a small box into his hand. “You can take off the cravat now.”

Dean stared down at the glass-topped box. Inside, a delicate, winged insect was gently pinned down, the metallic emerald green of its body bright in the evening light. He looked up at Cas, brows drawn.

“It’s _Lestes dryas decani_ , a new species of damselfly. I named it after you— _decanus_ is the Latin word for Dean, and _decani_ is the possessive form, so it’s your damselfly.”

Dean felt a smile break across his face, and he carefully placed the box on Cas’s writing desk before drawing Cas into a lingering kiss.

“You like it?” Cas looked almost shy. “I know it’s not a typical gift.”

“But it’s _you_ , Cas. It’s a gift that is perfectly you. I love it. But I know you hate killing insects just to study them.”

“Ah,” Cas said, “As luck would have it, I collected this specimen before I developed qualms of that nature. I had thought it unique, but didn’t think I could have been the first person to catalogue it. But I was.”

“And you named it after me.”

Cas drew Dean with him out of the study and toward the room they shared. “I did. I wanted entomologists years from now to know your name. You’re the reason I’m doing this work, so you should get the credit.”

Dean shook his head, laughing as Cas tugged him into the bedroom. A steaming tub of water greeted him.

“You were only pretending to be hard at work when I came in, weren’t you? You’ve been hauling water again.”

Cas had the grace to look embarrassed. “I knew you’d be dusty and tired, but I wanted to show you the damselfly first.”

“I’m only disappointed that you didn’t let me watch you. I like it when you haul water.”

Cas caught the teasing note in Dean’s voice and smiled. “I could make it up to you by bathing you.” The smile turned into a laugh as Dean began tearing off his clothes.

When Cas had arranged Dean to his liking in the bath, he dipped a cloth into the water and rubbed it against the cake of soap. Dean relaxed back, fighting the urge to close his eyes. Cas ran the cloth over his limbs with solemn concentration, his touch firm but gentle. His fingertips skated over the lines of muscle in Dean’s legs, and Dean stifled a groan. Cas cut him a look.

“We’re alone, you know.”

“I didn’t want to distract you from your work.”

“My work, as you call it, is just beginning.”

Dean did groan then. Cas alternated long, sure strokes of the soaped cloth with lingering explorations of the places Dean most enjoyed being touched—the side of his neck, the line of his collarbone, his hip, the hollow behind his knee. Cas, it seemed, was intent on touching him everywhere except where he most wanted. While the bath water cooled, Dean began to burn.

“Cas,” he gasped. “Please.”

Cas paused, “Please what?”

“Please touch me.”

“I am touching you.” Cas kept his voice neutral, curious. The impossible man had learned that Dean enjoyed it when he played the game of taking every word at face value, but now he was using that knowledge unfairly.

Dean growled. “You know damned well that I want you to touch my cock.”

“Oh,” Cas tried to keep a straight face, but a grin broke through. “I had no idea.” He cut off Dean’s retort with his lips, sealing his mouth over Dean’s and stroking his tongue into his mouth just as his hand wrapped around Dean’s erection under the water. Dean clasped the back of Cas’s neck and pulled him deeper into the kiss, almost dragging him into the bath in the process, but he would happily spend all night mopping up the floor for more of what Cas was giving him.

Cas’s grip was firm as sure as it stroked him under the water. He had rolled up his sleeves, and Dean broke off the kiss to watch the play of muscles in Cas’s forearm as he worked Dean to a fever pitch of pleasure. It was building at the base of his spine, gathering, tightening, ready to explode out, and he fell back against the edge of the bath, helpless. Cas slipped his other arm behind Dean, his mouth tracing a path from the base of Dean’s neck to the edge of his mouth. Dean gasped against Cas’s lips, “But you, what about—“

“We have all night, we have all the time in the world,” Cas cut him off, and Dean moaned at the ghost of a kiss that Cas dropped at the corner of his mouth. “I’m just getting started.” His hand continued moving, sure and firm, and Dean let himself fall apart, his muscles spasming so hard that he sloshed water out of the bath and onto the floor. Cas eased him through with kisses and whispered praise. The cooled water finally brought Dean back to himself, and he gave Cas a crooked, tired smile.

“If that was just the start, I might be in trouble.”

Cas helped Dean out of the bath, drying him with a length of toweling, and led him to the bed. He flashed Dean the wicked, private grin that he shared with no one else. “We’re both in trouble. But we’re very good at helping each other out of it.”

Dean laughed, tumbling into the bed and the happiness he could feel waiting for him, for them, for their future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lestes dryas (the Scarce Emerald Damselfly) is a real insect, but I decided to add some Latin to the end to make it Dean's. I hope that entomologists will forgive me for that.


End file.
